Skip to content

Shooter tapped by NBSHF

Lionel Leroy Murphy is the third shooter to be honoured by the North Bay Sports Hall of Fame. The announcement of Murphy’s election to the NBSHF was made by chairman Bill Jacko.
Lionel Leroy Murphy is the third shooter to be honoured by the North Bay Sports Hall of Fame.

The announcement of Murphy’s election to the NBSHF was made by chairman Bill Jacko.

“He helped found the North Bay Skeet and Trap Club and although he didn’t start competitive trap shooting himself until he was over 65 years of age, he won a Canadian senior veterans championship in 2003, when he was 78, and he has taken a number of provincial and state Championships,” Jacko said.

Born in Prince Edward Island, Murphy served 37 months with the Royal Canadian Naval Volunteer Reserve doing convoy duty in the Second World War.

He fought with the artillery in Korea and wore a military uniform for 32 years, retiring in North Bay.

In 1973, he was a founding member of the local skeet and trap club and contributed years of executive and fundraising work to that enterprise.

He began to shoot competitively in 1991 when he was 66 years old and has won numerous age class championships in events in Ontario, Quebec, Michigan, Ohio, Florida and Kentucky.

In 2003, he won the Canadian senior veterans trap title and captured Ontario veterans titles in 1991 and 1993; senior veteran categories in 1997,1998,1999 and 2003.

In 1999, he fired a category record 199 out of 200. He took a provincial trap singles senior veterans award in 1998.

Murphy captured three Ohio State veteran titles from 1991 through 1993, a Michigan Grand Lakes event and two Quebec provincial age class awards in 1994 and 1996.

These events draw as many as 6,000 overall entries with as many as 300 in a category.

In 2002, at the age of 77, he shot a record 199 out of 200 in a competition at St Thomas.

Currently Murphy shoots out of the Rock Cut Shooting and Sportsman’s Club in Powassan.

Murphy will be inducted at the NBSHF annual dinner and awards night Saturday April 17 at the Best Western.