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Show ! Ey PETER P. CARNEY. There are more trapshooters to the square yard in Wilmington, Del., than in any other city in this broad land, and they arc a chesty lot, too. The only Elks' lodge in the state of Delaware is located in "Wilmington, and nearly all of the trapshooters of the largest city in the smallest state in the union are t members of this lone lodge. And this brings ns down to the meat of the story. Despite the smallness of the state in area and population, the Delaware trap- ' shooters are confident that they can pick a team from among their numbers that can defeat any five representing the Elks' lodge of any other state, and in consequence they have issued a challenge chal-lenge to the trapshooters of the Elks' lodges of tho other states to meet thein on the traps during the convention of the B. P. O. E., in Baltimore. Said convention con-vention wdll take place during the week that is now on us. And the contest for certainly there are a number of states who will disagree with the Dcla-wareans Dcla-wareans will take place on Friday, July 14, starting at 10:30 o'clock in the mornjng on the grounds of the Oriole club. Throughout fhe west, especially on the Pacific coast, the Elks' lodges have formed many gun clubs. In many other states, where the Elks have not formed gun (dubs, many of the best trapshooters are affiliated with the organization. The suggestion broached by the Delaware Dela-ware lodge is that each state enter as many trapshooters as it wishes, the five highest scores to count. Each man will shoot at 100 targets. In order to insure additional interest in tho proposed tournament, tour-nament, the Delaware contingent announces an-nounces that they will give five trophies to the. winning team; five more to the second team, four class prizes and one prize for the poorest score. Tho Delaware band is interested in the promotion of trapshooting as a sport; they are anxious to interest brother Elks in the sport alluring and also anxious to bring back the laurels in the first tournament. There may be a number of surprised shooters when the entries are turned in. ! Portland was awarded the 1917 tournament tour-nament of the Sportsmen's Association of the Northwest. At the beginning of the present year there were 39(11 active gun clubs in the United States. Houston has been awarded the 1017 tournament of the Texas State Sports- , men's association. i Miss Olfldvs "Rfid. of Portland. Ore., i demonstrated in the northwest handicap handi-cap event in the Northwest Sportsmen 's association tournament that she is one of the coming women trapshooting experts ex-perts in the country. She broke 47 out of 50 tying for first place. Traphouses have been erected on the grounds of the Portland. Ore., gun club that will hold 30,000 targets. One of the most ardent trapshooters in the Pacific slope is C. A. Fleming, Mayor of Spokane, Wash. Seventy thousand targets were trapped in the two days' tournament of the California-Nevada State associations on the San Jose Cal., grounds. Henry Pfirrman, of Los Angeles, who won the California-Nevada State championship champ-ionship with 100 straight and had an unfinished run of 111 straight, is only a recruit at trapshooting. Three years ago this summer he was the rawest of ail novices; now he is one of the bet shots on the coast. The Oregon state shoot will be held in Salem in 191 7. Up in Alaska they have a lot of good trapshooters. Juneau has a club of live business men and they shoot team matches quite often with a club of business busi-ness men at Douglas, ' ' a suburb, ' ' across the Gasteneau channel. |