Another great digitized book with profiles and pics of the late 1800s shooters, including Annie Oakley and Doc Carver
The Art of Wing Shooting: A Practical Treatise on the Use of the Shotgun ...By William Bruce Leffingwell
Published by Rand, McNally & company, 1895
http://books.google.com/books?id=e34EmE3tkfkC On Annie Oakley
http://books.google.com/books?id=e34EmE3tkfkC&pg=PA108&output=text "I was permitted to examine many of the fine guns used by Miss Oakley in exhibition shooting, and noticed among them one Charles Lancaster ejector, one Charles Lancaster nonejector, a Cashmore hammerless, a magnificent Smith ejector with a gold figure of herself inlaid, a Parker hammer-less, a Scott Monte Carlo, a Scott ejector of highest quality, and an exquisite little Francotte ejector with Whit worth barrels. The value of the guns mentioned is $2,500. The rifles shown were Lancaster oval-bore .360 double-barrel, Holland hammerless .32-caliber double-barrel, a magnificent Marlin repeater, and a couple of handsome Winchesters. She also showed me two single-barreled pistols made by the celebrated maker, Gastinne Renette of Paris. These pistols have 14-inch barrels, and are made expressly for pigeon shooting. With them Miss Oakley has scored nine out of ten pigeons from two traps, using one-half ounce of shot. She shoots binocularly.
Her shot-guns weigh about six pounds each, the right barrels being bored modified, and the left full choke. Her load for targets is 2 3/4 drams of nitro powder and one ounce of shot. For live pigeons she uses three drams of powder, but the shot charge is unchanged; an ounce of shot is used on all occasions and for all kinds of game. Miss Oakley has demonstrated time and again the wonderful efficacy of the loads she uses. With her the scoring at no time is the result of a scratch or an accident. The center of the charge strikes the object fired at. That her position is correct is shown by the remarkable scores she has made. Using one ounce of shot, she was offered a purse of $200 if she could kill forty out of fifty selected birds, Hurlingham rules. This event was shot at Gloucester, N. J., July 30, 1888, and she won by scoring forty-nine out of the fifty. And again, on October 5th of the same year, at Trenton, N. J., in a match against Miles Johnson, at the State fair, and in the presence of 31,000 people, she again scored forty-nine out of fifty, defeating Johnson, who killed forty-three, and a purse of $300 was awarded her."
Trap and Pigeon Shooters
http://books.google.com/books?id=e34EmE3tkfkC&pg=PA115&output=text Rules for Live Bird Shooting
http://books.google.com/books?id=e34EmE3tkfkC&pg=PA178&output=text
