Baxter Turkey Shoot will be held this Sunday
One of the things Jo Myrsaides liked about the sixth annual Al Baxter Memorial Turkey Shoot last year was bidding on the shooters in the auction. Myrsaides’ late husband, an Iowa Department of Natural Resources conservation officer, would have approved of the shooter she picked to bid on, New Hampton senior trapshooter Christian Schwickerath. The auction takes place before the shooter takes aim at 50 targets and the winning shooter earns their bidder some money. “I bought Christian, and he told me ‘you’re putting a lot of pressure on me to win,’” recalled the Alta Vista woman. When he did win, though, Myrsaides donated the money back to a scholarship fund in memory of her late husband. In May the fund awarded five $750 scholarships to seniors involved in trapshooting, which all happened to be from New Hampton. Those involved in trapshooting from Fredericksburg are also eligible for the funds. The turkey shoot was started by Baxter and many of the events are still in place this year, when the seventh annual shoot takes place at the Fredericksburg Sportsmen’s Club near Boyd. There will be a gun raffle and a free-will offering meal will take place, with chefs on hand grilling meat from the Elma Locker. “So that’s always good,” said Myrsaides. “There will also be other shooting games for meat prizes — Al always called it a turkey shoot — but we’ll have turkey and steaks from Elma and the Frederika Lockers. There’s also about 50 other raffle prizes other than the gun.” And again, the auction. “The bidding gets pretty fun, Chuck Stanton does the auctioneering and some people donate their winnings back to the scholarship, but the money is theirs if they want it.” The turkey shoot begins Sunday, Aug. 27 at noon and runs to 4 p.m., and anyone just wanting to watch some good shooting is welcome as well. The shoot will take place rain or shine, but there will be indoor activities if it rains too hard and all the prizes will still be awarded. “It’ll be a fun day, it always is.”
