National Mid-Winter Pistol Championships
Tampa, Florida

Marines Take Top Shooting Honors

By LEE LaCOMBE

Marine Corps handgunners walked off with top honors yesterday in the first pair of Olympic-style pistol matches at the National Mid-Winter Championships on the Tampa Police Range.

WO Francis Higginson, Placerville, Calif., chalked up his second straight international victory when he captured the center fire event with a score of 595 of a possible 600 in the dual stage event.

His teammate, GySgt. Billy Taggart, Quantico, Va., made it an all-Leatherneck day when he came home in front in free pistol with 527 points.

Jimmy Dorsey of Spokane, Wash., was high civilian in both matches with a free pistol score of 509 and 583 in the dual match. Jerry Lynch of St. Petersburg Police Dept., was top expert in center fire with 573; Dan Krasun, River Rouge, Mich. Police Dept. was high sharpshooter with 542 and John Grogan, Toledo, O., led the marksmen with 560.

Tampa's Sherman Pitts was high expert in slow fire with 479; USAF Capt. Joe Schule, Tampa, led the sharpshooters with 496, and Grogan was again high marksman with 489 points.

The matches continue today with rapid fire and standard pistol matches.

The Tampa Tribune, March 10, 1972

Willis In Pistol Victory

By LEE LaCOMBE

The Army nailed its first victory of the National Mid-Winter Pistol Championships yesterday when Sfc Roger H. Willis, Columbus, Ga., scored a very fine 582 out of a possible 600 points despite strong, gusty winds to capture the Olympic-style Standard Pistol match.

His teammate Army Sfc. John Sicinski, also of Columbus, was runnerup with a 577.

Jimmy Dorsey of Spokane, Wash., took civilian honors with a 577.

The match is one of four at this year's championships that will determine invitations from the National Rifle Association to the top finishers to go to Phoenix, Ariz., in June to try out for the U.S. Olympic Shooting Team, which will participate in the Summer Games at Munich in August and September.

Frank Coffey, Panama City, Fla., topped the Experts with a 557; USAF Capt. Joe Schlue of Tampa led the sharpshooters with 536 and Raymond Del Rio of Gulfport, Miss., was high marksman with 439 points.

The battle for individual honors in the Mid-Winter Championships starts today with four former winners in the field of 250 contestants from two dozen states.

The Tampa Tribune, March 11, 1972

Shooters In 2-Way Gun Duel

By LEE LaCOMBE

A two-way battle for individual honors in the National Mid-Winter Pistol Championships developed yesterday as Army SFC Hershel Anderson, Tracy City, Tenn., and Marine WO Francis Higginson, Placerville, Calif., ended the first eight matches deadlocked with 1768 point totals out of a possible 1800.

Higginson, who captured the Palmetto tournament at Miami a week ago, won the sub-aggregate .22 caliber pistol event with a four-match total of 891 points while Anderson checked in with an 889. But the Tennessean overtook the front-runner in the Center Fire match posting an 879 to 877 for Higginson.

The Center Fire sub-aggregate was taken by Army Sfc Harland Rennolds, Detroit, Mich., with a score of 880 points and he has a total of 1745 points and is tied for sixth place with Army Sfc Bonnie Harmon, Columbus, Ga.

Trailing the leaders in third place is John Johnson, who has held the national civilian pistol title, from La Habra, Calif., with 1763 points.

The Tampa Tribune, March 12, 1972

Anderson In Pistol Victory

By LEE LaCOMBE

Army Sfc. Hershel Anderson of Tracy City, Tenn., broke out of a two-way deadlock yesterday to capture the National Mid-Winter individual pistol title with an aggregate score of 2, 642 points out of a possible 2,700.

He had been tied with Marine WO Francis Higginson, Placerville, Calif., with 1788 points at the start of the day's action, but the Leatherneck could not keep up with Anderson and wound up second with 2,640 points.

John Johnson of LaHabra, Calif., topped all civilian entries with 2,633 and national police champion Elwyn Burnett of Lansing, Mich., posted a 2,506 to win in that category.

Army SSgt. Barbara Hile of Lapeer, Mich., won her fourth straight women's crown as she check in with 2,546 points, which was 43 points higher than runnerup Lucille Chambliss of Winter Haven Police Dept., who has won this event in the women's class 13 times.

The last four individual matches of the Mid-Winter were fired with .45 caliber pistols and the sub-aggregate went to Army Sfc. Bonnie Harmon, Columbus, Ga., with a fine 880.

Anderson also won the International Rapid Fire match, the last of four Olympic-style events, with a 590 point total and took the aggregate of the quartet of competitions with 2,280 points.

The top finishers in the international matches will receive an invitation from the National Rifle Association to come to Phoenix, Ariz. in June to try out for the U.S. Olympic Shooting Team.

The Tampa Tribune, March 13, 19721

Marksmen See Olympic Success

By PAUL GRISCTI
Tribune Sports Writer

Two of the country's top pistol marksmen said the United States should place well in the small and large bore rifle competition at the Munich Olympics this summer.

Lt. Col. William McMillan, who has been on the past five Olympic pistol teams and won the rapid-fire Gold Medal in the 1960 games in Rome, and SFC James McNally, a member of the 1968 team, made their comments while competing in the national Mid-Winter Pistol championships held this weekend at the Tampa police range.

McMillan, team captain of the Marine Corps shooting team, has been firing competitively since 1952. He said the U.S. team should place will in the rifle categories "where there are many top-grade shooters in the country.

"But there just aren't that many pistol shooters because of expense and time involved in practicing," McMillan said. McNally, shooting for the U.S. Army team and a bronze medalist in the 1962 world championships, agreed.

"It takes a lot of practice to develop the rapid fire technique," McNally added. Rapid fire involves shooting at five silhouette targets in two five-round strings. The strings are timed, first eight seconds, then six and finally four.

"Time for aiming is practically nil, especially in the four-second string," McNally said. "We've got it figured at two seconds (in a four second string) to fire that first round, then three-tenths of second to turn and fire at each of the other four."

The Tampa Tribune, March 13, 1972

Scarlet Entry Wins Pistol Shoot

By LEE LaCOMBE

The Marine Corp's Scarlet entry won the prestigious aggregate team championship of the National Mid-Winter Pistol competition yesterday despite the fact that they did not capture any of the fired events.

The Marines posted a four-match total of 3501 points to edge the runnerup Army Blue squad by just four points.

These were the final matches in this year's championships, which are hosted by the Tampa Pistol Club and sanctioned by the National Rifle Association.

The Tampa Tribune, March 14, 1972

Marine Shooters Grab Top Honors In Florida Meets

By MGySgt Frank H. Almeida

For CWO2 Francis Higginson, one of the "top" handgun shooters on the Marine Corps Pistol Team, the Marine Corps Pistol Team, the 1972 shooting season got off to an award winning start.

Earlier this month, the team headed South to Florida for the Palmetto Open (Miami) and National Mid-Winter Pistol Championship at Tampa. There the team faced some of the top competitors in the field of pistol shooting. Although Higginson got off to a slow start in the .22 caliber events he was only six points off the aggregate winner with 884-38. Turning to the centerfire match, he posted a 294-16X to take the top slot in the national match course and ended up with an 881-48 for the centerfire aggregate - two points away from the match winner.

By now, both he and teammate, LtCol William McMillan had loosened up and between them, they dominated the .45 caliber match. Higginson started it off by winning the slow-fire match with a 196-8. He lost out to an Army shooter in the national match course by two points, firing a 293-13. Col "Mac" came through with a 200-15 to capture the time-fire match, while Higginson racked up a 199-9 in the rapid-fire event to end up with an 888-41 for the aggregate honor.

For his three-gun effort, he posted a Grand Aggregate of 2653-130 to out-shoot the 132 participants competing for the tournament title. He then followed this up by taking top honors in the International Standard Pistol aggregate with a 578.

In team competition, the USMC "Scarlet" team garnered top laurels in the centerfire match with their 1166-47.

This was the start of things to come as the team moved to Tampa. By now, the wrinkles were out and it was time for serious shooting - two hundred and eighty shooters were present for the Mid-Winter Championship.

GySgt. Billy Taggart got the ball rolling by top billing in the International Slow-Fire event with a score of 527. Higginson's 595 in the International center-fire match placed him at the top of the award schedule for that event.

Moving on the conventional shooting, Higginson placed third and fifth in the .22 caliber slow-fire and national match course, respectively. Then turning on the coal, he proceeded to mark wins in the time-fire (200-12) , rapid-fire (200-14) and aggregate with 891-46.

In the center-fire match, the "Gunner" tallied third place honors in the slow-fire (190-6) and national match course (292-13) events.

Wrapping up his wins in the Championship, Higginson gained top laurels in the .45 caliber time-fire (200-12); .45 caliber Service Pistol national match course (295-14); Service Pistol Aggregate (870-36) and .45 caliber and Service Pistol Aggregate with a 1742-70.

LtCol McMillan eked out a top place slot in the .45 caliber rapid-fire match with his 200-6.

In the "new-comer" department, to the Marine Corps Team, Sgt. Mike Bonafede placed third in the Service Pistol slow-fire event with a 190-2, while a fellow "new-comer," SSgt. Dean Robbins dominated the Service Pistol rapid-fire match with a blazing 196-11.

Perseverance paid off in team competition for the USMC "Scarlet" team, composed of McMillan, Higginson, Taggart and SSgt Doug Oxford, placing second in all of the three team matches, the "Fearsome-Foursome" tallied a total three-gun team score of 3509 to win the coveted team Grand Aggregate event.

Behind the scene, but never far away from the team shooters, were two men whose importance to the team is vital, they are armorers, GySgt. Tal Parker and SSgt. Bill Wiseman travel with the team and were available on a moment's notice for any repairs or routine maintenance.

Photo by MGySgt Frank Almeida
Quantico Sentry, Wednesday, March 31, 1972