Once upon a time not so long ago, there were “open” events in International Shooting Union (UIT) events where the best shooters in the world, male or female, could represent their country.  A few very talented and dedicated females earned the right to represent their countries in these “open” events in the Olympic Games, Pan American Games, World Shooting Championships, World Air Gun Championships, World Shotgun Championships and the Championships of the Americas.  Today there are separate events for Men, Women, Junior Males or Junior Females in these Championships, so there are no longer any “open” events.  This is the story of the few women who competed on the U.S. Shooting Team in the “open” events.

 

The First – The first woman that competed in an open UIT event with the U.S. Shooting Team was Catherine (Kay) Woodring, wife of William B. Woodring, one of the top USA smallbore rifle prone shooters.  But first, a little history to help set the stage. 

The USA first competed in the World Shooting Championships when they hosted the 1913 World Shooting Championships at Camp Perry, Ohio.  The USA shooters were mostly interested in high power service rifle shooting, especially long distance prone events using the Model 1903 Springfield rifle.  The rest of the world focused more on the 300 meter free rifle event (40 prone, 40 kneeling, 40 standing).  Because of the Great War the USA didn’t compete again internationally until the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp.   

One item that is interesting as a historical footnote is that it was the USA shooters who introduced the world to the use of the sling in the prone and kneeling positions in Antwerp.  Up until that time shooters shot those positions without any support.  Imagine what a different event rifle shooting would be today without the use of a sling!   

From the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp through the 1930 World Shooting Championships in Antwerp, the USA did very well, winning many of the championships and setting many of the world records.  The NRA’s heart was just not into international-style shooting though.  The December 1930 American Rifleman article reporting on the 1930 World Shooting Championships finished with these paragraphs, 

“America is now the holder of the International Championship of the World (300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 shots), but it has recently been decided that we will not attempt to send a team to Poland next year.  This means, of course, that the Argentine Cup will have to leave the office of the Assistant Secretary of War, where it now reposes, and be sent back to Lwow (Lemberg), to be given to next year’s victor.

 

The decision not to compete in the future International Free-Rifle Matches is based on the fact that shooting with the free-rifle is not an American sport.  Our own rifle shooting is almost entirely with the service Springfield rifle or with the .22, straight trigger.  The old Schuetzen set trigger work has passed out of existence in this country, and there are few of our shooters who know how to use set triggers.  The set triggers and other special free-rifle equipment are not used in our matches and can not be obtained in this country except when specially handmade at very great cost, or else purchased abroad and remade to fit our ammunition.  Under these circumstances the only free-rifle shots are that handful of shooters, who since the World War, have interested themselves in bringing back to America the World Championship.

 

To continue to play the free-rifle game will mean a great deal of expense for a game in which very few of our shooters are or can be interested and in which the majority of them have no opportunity to compete.

 

Owing to these circumstances the N. R. A. has decided that the money spent of International Matches shall be expended on a type of competition in which most American rifle shots are vitally interested and in which they themselves have a chance to compete, namely, the small-bore straight-shooting using metallic sights.  A series of small-bore International Matches is now being arranged, and this subject will be covered in detail in a later issue (Pershing Trophy Teams).”

 

After the 1937 Pershing Trophy match at Bisley, England, five USA smallbore rifle prone shooters stayed in Europe to travel to Helsinki, Finland for the 1937 World Shooting Championships on their own nickel.  The team was composed of William B. and Kay Woodring, William P. Schweitzer, John B. Adams and Dave Carlson.  William Woodring won the NRA National Smallbore Rifle Prone Championships at Camp Perry in 1936, 37 and 38, while Dave Carlson won it in 1940.  William P. Schweitzer won the British Smallbore Rifle Prone Championships at Bisley in 1939, 1953 and 1954. 

Kay Woodring had only been shooting one year at that time and held up very well shooting a 392x400.  The USA team won the gold medal in the 50-meter Smallbore Free Rifle Prone 40 shots event in very windy conditions.  Back then teams were allowed coaching on the line and the Americans were used to reading the wind and coaching each other from their NRA smallbore prone experience in team matches.  Kay was not only the first USA woman to compete in an open event in an UIT Championship, but she was also the first to help win a team world championship! 

About fourteen years ago, the U.S. Shooting Team Foundation (USSTF) and the NRA each received a bequest from the estate of William B. Woodring.  The USSTF used the interest off it for many years to help support the National Junior Olympic Rifle Championships. 

In Col. Crossman’s book, Olympic Shooting, he states, “My mother, Blanche Crossman, had been the first woman to shoot on a U.S. international rifle team, way back in 1919 and 1920.”  He was referring to her competing on the USA team in the Dewar Team Postal Match as there were no International Shooting Union competitions conducted in those years, except the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp and she definitely did not compete in it.

“The Next“ - Evelyn Primm and Carola Mandel competed on the U. S. Shooting Team at the 1958 World Shooting Championships in Moscow, USSR in the Open Trap (Clay Pigeon) 200 bird event and Open Skeet 200 bird event. 

The only Women’s events in the whole World Shooting Championships that year were for Women’s 50 meter Rifle 3x30 shots and Women’s English Match 50 meter + 100m Prone (30 + 30).  The women shot free rifles then and fired 30 shots each in the prone, kneeling and standing positions.  The prone event was 30 shots at 50 meters and 30 shots at 100 meters.  The juniors also shot those two events.  Two of the German junior shooters Peter Kohnke and Bernd Klingner later became Olympic Champions in 1960 and 1968 in prone and three-position events respectively. 

In the trap event each country designated five shooters for the team event with the top four scores counting for the team aggregate.  There were six USA trap shooters on the trip.  Evelyn Primm was one of the five picked to shoot and was the fifth (or non-counting) USA shooter and the team won a Bronze.  She placed 74^th of 80 shooters.  In the Skeet event, the team placed 4^th.  A “Mandel” placed 16^th of 46, but the results are not clear if it was Carola Mandel or her husband Leon Mandel.

“The WAC” – Margaret Thompson (later Murdock) joined the U. S. Army Marksmanship Training Unit at Fort Benning, GA after graduating from Kansas State University and joining the Women’s Army Corps (WAC).  She was affectionately known as “The WAC” by her teammates.  She not only made the Women’s Rifle Team for the 1966 World Shooting Championships in Wiesbaden, Germany, but she made the Open 50 meter Free Rifle Team and the Open 300 meter Free Rifle Team. 

Gary L. Anderson remembered, "I remember a lot of other countries being pretty worked up about having to shoot against a woman in our "men's" competitions, but I don't remember it being that big a deal to us. Bill Pullum was our team coach and he always did a great job of isolating shooters from the political controversies. Most of what we heard, in fact, we heard after the competition.  The squadding for the competition was different then. We had two shooters together on one relay and two shooters together on the second relay. Wigger and Foster wanted to shoot together in 300m and Wigger and Pool wanted to shoot together in 50m. That meant I shot with Margaret in both events.  That brought us a few more spectators. I knew she was capable of holding her own as a U. S. team member and the U. S. Shooting Team shooters already accepted her as a team member."

(Wigger could give some good quotes too.)

Margaret not only won the Women’s Standard Rifle 3x20 event with a new World Record and placed second in the Women’s Standard Rifle Prone event, she helped the Open Free Rifle Teams set World Records in 50 meter Free Rifle Prone 40 shots, 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 shots, 300 meter Free Rifle Standing 40 shots and 300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 shots.  Individually she placed 4^th in 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 shots event and 5^th in 300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 shots event.  All together she won one individual World Championship, three team World Championships, set one individual World Record and four team World Records.  Not a bad start!  Margaret Murdock was the first female in history to help set an International Shooting Union Team World Record in an Open event.

In the 1967 Pan American Games in Winnipeg, Canada she won the 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 event and tied the World Record in the 50 meter Free Rifle Kneeling event.  The USA team won the team gold medal needless to say.  She was the first female in history to set an International Shooting Union Individual World Record in an Open event.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Shooting Union (UIT) decided to make the Olympic shooting events “open” events instead of “men’s” events in the upcoming 1968 Olympic Games to be held in Mexico City, Mexico.  There was great anticipation to see what would happen. 

During the 1968 Olympic Trials at Camp Bullis, north of San Antonio, TX, Margaret won the 50 meter Free Rifle Prone event, placed 3^rd in the 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 event and 8^th in the 300 meter Free Rifle event, but only the top two shooters in the 50m Free Rifle 3x40 event and the top two shooters in 300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 event got to go to Mexico City. 

The first three females to shoot in the Olympic Games were Eulalia Rolinska, Poland, 22^nd in smallbore rifle prone; Gladys de Seminario, Peru, 31^st in smallbore rifle prone; and Nuria Ortez, Mexico, 13^th in skeet in the 1968 Olympic Games.  Nuria placed 4^th in Open Skeet at the 1969 World Moving Target Championships in San Sebastian.

Margaret had married Marine Gil Murdock and was pregnant with her son during the 1970 World Shooting Championships held at the Black Canyon Shooting Range north of Phoenix, AZ.  She won the 300 meter Free Rifle Standing World Championship, but was denied the 300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 World Championship when she ran out of time due to slow pit service and didn’t get to fire a round in the prone position.  She was the first female in history to win an individual open World Shooting Championship.  By the way, she won the Women’s Standard Rifle 3x20 event with an individual World Record and the USA won that team event with a team World Record.  She also helped the USA open free rifle team win World Team Championships in 300 meter Free Rifle 3x40 and 300 meter Free Rifle Standing events. 

In 1973 Margaret came back to compete on the open USA Free Rifle Team in the 1^st Championships of the Americas (CAT) held in Mexico City, Mexico. She helped the team win the 300m Free Rifle 3x40 event and the 50m Free Rifle 3x40 event.  They set four team World Records (50m 3x40, 50m 40 prone, 50m 40 standing, 50m 40 kneeling).

At the 1974 World Shooting Championships in Thun, Switzerland Margaret continued her winning ways winning the Women’s 50 meter Standard Rifle Prone event tying the World Record and helping the USA win that team championship. She shot on the open 50 meter Free Rifle Team and helped win World Team Championships in 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 and 50 meter Free Rifle Standing.  The USA set another Team World Record in 50 meter Free Rifle 40 standing.

During the 1975 Pan American Games in Mexico City she won the 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 event, helped the USA win the 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40  and 50 meter Free Rifle Prone team events, and set another open individual World Record in the 50m Free Rifle Standing event (385). 

In the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal she won an Olympic Silver Medal after tying Lanny Bassham in the 50 meter Free Rifle 3x40 event, but losing the tie-breaker.  She was the first female shooter to win an Olympic medal in shooting.

“The Youngest” – Gloria Parmentier became the third and youngest female USA shooter to make an open US Shooting Team when she earned her way on the open 10 meter Air Rifle Team in the 1975 Pan American Games in Mexico City, Mexico.  She was a senior in high school in Virginia at the time.  The USA team won the team gold medal.  Gloria later joined the U. S. Army Marksmanship Unit and competed on many U.S. Shooting Teams 1977-87 and placed 4^th in the Women’s Standard Rifle 3x20 event in the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.  

“The other WAC” – Wanda Jewell joined the U. S. Army Marksmanship Unit in 1976 after graduating from Eastern Washington State University.  The Army had done away with the Women’s Army Corps by then and assigned females directly to different branches like the Ordnance Corps, Military Police Corps, Adjutant General Corps, etc.  They were still informally known as “WAC’s”.  Wanda competed in the 1974 World Shooting Championships while still in college, but didn’t do as well as she wanted to.  She was ready by 1978 and won two individual World Championships and three team World Championships.  In 1979 she became the fourth USA female to make an open US Shooting Team when she shot 10 meter Air Rifle 40 shots at the Pan American Games in San Juan, Puerto Rico.  Her team won the gold medal. 

“Juniors” – The International Shooting Union held the 1^st World Air Gun Championships in Seoul, Korea in August 1979.  There were separate Junior Air Rifle and Junior Air Pistol events, along with Women’s and Men’s events.  Elaine Proffitt competed on an “open” Junior team with Rod Fitz-Randolph and John Rost to win the gold medal in the junior team event.

“New Olympic Events” - After the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, the International Olympic Committee and the International Shooting Union created three separate women’s shooting events for the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles doing away with “open” events.  Linda Thom of Canada became the first female to win an Olympic Gold Medal in shooting when she edged Ruby Fox of the USA to win the Women’s Sport Pistol event in 1984.  Ruby Fox became the first USA female to win an Olympic Medal in a women’s Olympic shooting event.  Pat Spurgin became the first USA female to win an Olympic Gold Medal a couple of days later.  Wanda Jewell won an Olympic Bronze Medal in the Women’s Standard Rifle 3x20 event.

“Olympic Shotgunners” – For the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, Korea the IOC and UIT decided to make the Trap and Skeet events “open” events again, but with a twist to encourage female participation.  They set aside some “slots” for a few females to be able to compete in those two shotgun events.  Carolyn Koch represented the USA in Trap, while Terry Bankey represented the USA in Skeet. 

“Junior Shotgunners” – At the 1991 World Shotgun Championships held in Perth, Australia, the USA had a female, Dorie Ann Van Den Top make the open Junior Skeet Team as there weren’t separate junior male and junior female events at that time.  Dorie joined Shane Schwickerath and Jason Ward to win a Silver Medal.

“The Last One” – For the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain, the IOC and UIT again created some “slots” reserved for females in the open shotgun events. Connie Schiller earned one of those slots and competed in the open Skeet event.

Females went out with a bang in the “open” events that year as a young Chinese girl, Shan Zhang, won the Skeet event in 1992 with a World Record 200/200.  She was the first, last and only female to win an Olympic Gold Medal in an open Olympic shooting event.   

“Other notable female shooting facts” -   At the 1954 World Shooting Championships in Caracas, Venezuela Ketty Baldwin, representing Peru in the smallbore rifle prone event placed 15^th tying the great USSR shooter A. Bogdanov. 

Nonka Matova from Bulgaria set the open 50m Free Rifle 3x40 World Record (1172) and the open 50m Free Rifle Kneeling World Record (397) in the late 1970’s and competed in the 1980 Olympic Games.

There are now no “open” events in Olympic or International Sport Shooting Federation (ISSF) events.  There are many more opportunities for female shooters though.  These women were some of the best that ever shot.