IHMSA Memorabilia

[WA_SHTR+44M]

Just trowing out a bit of curiosity on some things dating back to the early days of silhouette shooting and came across an old article where you could purchase the Gun Digest of Metallic Silhouette Shooting by Elgin Gates. I was very intrigued by this and pulled up information on the web about it and found that there were other additions to this. I purchased a used copy to see what this is all about and eager to read it. Anyone out there willing to shed their thoughts on this and your thoughts on the additional publications following ie.. 2nd edition and if there were more to follow this concept.
Love the history of Silhouette and I am trying to find some of the older "HayDay" things that symbolize the origins of the Silhouette Steel Game.

Steve 7771

[260 Striker]

Look for a book called "Shooting Steel". Much more details about guns, loads, past Silhouette articles, early Internationals match reports and lots of letters sent to the Editor of the Silhouette newspaper. Gun Digest book OK but Shooting Steel is way better.

[WA_SHTR+44M]

I shall see if I can find that publication. If anyone out there might have this book could you see about getting me the ISBN number on the book and that will make it easier for me to locate. Another oddity that caught my attention was the use of shoot-off targets called TRAMS using the body of a turkey and the head of the ram as one target. They said that they placed them somewhere between the turkey and ram line and they actually looked rather interesting to put in the sights and send a round out to them.
Steve 7771

[IKE]

I looked on my copy and there is no ISBN number.

[260 Striker]

WA_SHTR, The odd ball TRAM target might have been used by some club for shootoff targets years ago but IHMSA made a ruling years ago that shootoff targets had to be the same shape as the normal targets. Of course many of those are a lot smaller in size but would still look like a normal C, P, T or R. Back in 1982 at the Internationals in Indianapolis the shootoff targets were snuff cans painted white and laying flat on the pig line. I think there was some protests at the time and later IHMSA made the rule about keeping shootoff targets shaped like normal animals. The TRAM did look funny though. The Shooting Steel book was published in 1986 and shows up every so often on eBay. You might want to post a want ad on this site to see if anyone has an extra copy.

[dan in mi]

I remember the shoot off rule change. Prior to that we had "turkeys eggs" basically a hockey puck out of steel. Following the change one year we had IPSC IHMSA shoot offs. Turkeys were holding rams hostage (and similar) you had to hit the rear target without hitting the front target. People whined about that too.


I may have a second Shooting Steel. I know I have more than one Gun Digest of Metallic Silhouette Shooting by Elgin Gates.

Shoot me an email spinrite at Comcast dot net

[WA_SHTR+44M]

Hey dan in mi,

Sent you an email about the Shooting Steel booklet. Very interested to see about the various articles and data that could be there.

Steve 7771

[Oldfart]

I've got all four books by Elgin Gates I liked the GunDigest book of metallic Silhouette shooting 2nd Edition,the best
Shooting steel will always have a home in my library

[aggshooter]

Pretty sure I have some TRAMS in the shed. I may have to break them out for the 4H kids to play with.

Also remember shooting hostage chickens in rimfire. A chicken placed behind the ram and between the ram legs at 100y. While it may have been fun for the guys really into their unlimited guns, I never cared for it. Just put a 1/5 scaled chicken there instead and call it good.

Similar to a regional I went to that had half scale targets for shootoffs at 200m for all scoped guns. The 2 guys that tied in US had to shoot the same targets as the freestyle guns. Ten shots later the victory score was 1-0 when somebody finally scored a hit.