Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 1925 Drexel Women's Rifle Team

I was surfing around this morning & a picture popped up that piqued my interest. I still shoot B&W film and do a lot of old photo restorations, so I always like a good historical photo.

The photo below is of the 1925 Drexel Women's Rifle Team in Philadelphia. The program started in 1919 as part of the ROTC (which women were not allowed to join) but included women in competitions shortly thereafter. It appears from this picture that the Winchester 52 was a popular choice if I'm not mistaken. I think I could have survived the impending Great Depression knocking over banks in the midwest with the chick on the right.



Apparently they developed a pretty good reputation over the next ~75 years and won some championships.





I saw an online comment from a foreign student who thought someone was pranking him when he was told one of the university buildings had a "Rifle Room" as part of the 3rd & 4th floors.



That's a pretty good crowd in the background. For many years & into the 1990's, the university had a Turkey Shoot to raise money for the club. You could compete as an individual, a department, a dorm floor, etc. Your best five shots determined the winner of a frozen turkey. You could pay extra money for additional rounds as part of the fundraiser in order to improve your score. Department heads and the university president would sometimes show up to shoot.



Eventually the university pulled the plug on the program in 2003 "... due to public safety concerns, a lack of leadership and the need for expensive renovations to the rifle range, as the same one had been in use since 1928". We all know how dangerous target shooters with rimfires and iron sights can be to society so yea, let's improve "public safety" by eliminating formal training. The rifle room was turned into a research computing lab.

First of all, I'm really glad to see women's involvement in shooting but don't make the chick on the right mad, as I don't know what she's holding in her coat.

I didn’t know Duct Tape was around in 1925. 😁 (first photo)

I was a student at the University of Colorado, Boulder, in the early 1990's. Boulder, Colorado, is one of the most liberal cities in the U.S. I was shocked to learn that there was an indoor rifle range under the basketball court in the school gymnasium. I never heard of any school shooting team, or anyone using that indoor range while I was a student. I am sure the shooting team had been disbanded years prior, and that space was just waiting to be re-purposed. Anyway, it is an interesting piece of history and a showing of how values have changed.

And, I have a buddy whose daughter went to college on a shooting scholarship at some school in the Appalachia region. That was in the 2000's time frame. I didn't know such a thing existed. How cool would that be - get free tuition for honing your shooting skills.

Cool

“Chick on the right”

That’s a MAN baby!!!

It may be Oscar Wilde.

In the leopard coat🤢

Neat stuff.


A year or two ago I had a Remington 513T at the range. A couple of fellows in their late 20's/early 30's were there shooting with their tricked out long range pieces. Not sure how the conversation got around to it but they asked about the 513 and I said it was a mid-level target rifle such as might have been used by a high school or junior college rifle team.

They didn't believe me at all - not about the rifle but that there could ever have been such a thing as a high school or college rifle team. I assured them such things used to be commonplace but don't think they ever got over their skepticism.

They all have black around the eyes as if they just got over Bubonic Plague

😵‍💫

That’s not duct tape, it’s old fashion electrical tape, been around for decades, before vinyl was developed. Wy dad was an electrician and he used it clear up into the 50’s, I remember it well, taped a lot of broken handle hay forks, axes, and shovels and yes even rifle and baseball bats.

2nd pic 2nd from left don knots kin ppl

That's not bubonic plague, that's good ole 1925 corrective action from their husbands or boyfriends lol

Katie Zaun shoots 22and air rifle at TCU. UWV has a shooting team and at her colleges do. Not as many as years ago.

A Winder musket and a couple Springfield 1922s in the first picture in addition to the 52s. Pretty neat

There used to be a 50’ rimfire rifle range under the seats of the old Tulane stadium. Their NROTC rifle team used to hold an invitational rifle match for all the teams in the Southeast. IIRC, it was always around Mardi Gras time. By my senior year I had been the Ole Miss team captain for three years and I missed third place by 1 point, most likely due to one too many beers the night before. Dummy 😡!

At one time there were 447 universities/colleges that offered full four year scholarships to students that were competitive shooters and now it would be difficult to find a dozen that offer same scholarships!

"Once we were a Nation of Riflemen! Today....we're a Nation of IDIOTS"!

True that.

Here's a list of NCAA colleges that still have rifle shooting teams. Looks to be about 28 college teams, nationwide. Lots of tiny schools on the list. I bet part of the attraction is that, once the equipment is purchased, it is an inexpensive athletic program to maintain. If properly cared for, a .22 rimfire rifle would pretty much last forever. The only expense would be ammo and targets.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NCAA_rifle_programs

In the early 80's when I was the head photographer for LSU's student newspaper, The Reveille, I would sometimes go over to the Military Science building and shoot photos of some of the indoor matches they were having there. Before posting the photos above, I Googled to see if that range was still there but couldn't find any indication that it was still in use. Seems like there would have been a recent photo if it was. Most of the ROTC hits I got seemed to be focused more on a cyber threat than a shooting threat.

My high school had ROTC. Basement range where they built the cafeteria. So the cafeteria door was "armored" - clad in metal plating etc.

Used to joke it's because of quality of food.

Bet they won’t burn the toast again.

Those are some cool photos!

My two oldest granddaughters both graduated from an all girls school that had a trap team. Of the two, I never would have guessed that the older one would have wanted to shoot. My son in law is an avid hunter so I guess that’s where it came from. She and her sister have both bagged some really nice Delta bucks over the last couple of years and have enjoyed dove and duck hunting too.

Tennessee Tech had air rifle and small bore rifle teams when I was there and as far as I know, still do.

Sorry to say, but it appears the Golden Eagles at Tennessee Tech lost their rifle team in 2010 due to funding issues.

https://www.ttusports.com/releases/2009-10/4_8_restructuring

Wasn't Drexel the pimp in the movie True Romance?

Took a marksmanship & orienteering class at NWMSU in 1986. Shot 10 meters with Remington and Winchester rimfires, useful and fun class!

Drexl Spivey had only one “e”. Gary Oldman in dreadlocks (upper left) looks a bit different than when he played Winston Churchill (upper right).

Wasn't his acting in True Romance magnificent? My favorite movie.

When I was in highschool in the early 1960's I was on the rifle team, taught my younger sister to shoot and she joined the rifle team at her highschool. Along comes the city championship pitting the two schools against one another, my sister shot well enough to take first place and I took second. Still have the silver medal and varsity letters from shooting team. I shot a Springfield 1922 when they were available, if not a Mossberg 144.