Friendship, Indiana - One of the highlights of the National Muzzle Loading Rifle Association's Spring Shoot is the Primitive Encampment/Living History Center, a section of the property that appears to have traveled backwards in time to the earliest days of the United States.

Here, you could find people dressed up in pre-1840s attire and living in canvas tents and log cabins throughout the week. Visitors, affectionately referred to as "flatlanders," would occasionally come through and browse the wares and admire the setups, but this wasn't all for them. A "commericial row" was set up to sell handmade items to people of every time, but the people in the Primitive Encampment were there for each other, as a hobby they enjoyed, more than residents of the 21st century.

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Shirts for the 2012 Black Powder Target Rifle Championships arrived this week and hey ... they look great. Made with lightweight, breathable fabric that only Under Armour can provide, these shirts are restricted. Restricted to those who come out to the NRA Whittington Center in Raton, New Mexico for this year's Black Powder Target Rifle Championships.

Registration is currently open, so reserve your spot today. Shot August 18-25 at NRA's Whittington Center, these championships are a very fun week of shooting in the NRA's oldest discipline.

"I'm so excited for this year's championships," Match Director Jonathan Leighton told us. "The match is shaping up well, the prize table is filling up with many a great things and just about every shooter will walk away with something." 

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Flint sparks the powder milliseconds before the Wall Gun fires.

Centreville, Virginia - One of the biggest attractions every year at the Centreville NRA Women On Target® Clinic are the blackpowder rifles. Taking a step into yesteryear, the ladies are transported to the time before smokeless and self-contained cartridges. With a Wall Gun, Blunderbuss, Kentucky Rifle and just begging to be fired, there was a consistent flow of customers to each and every station.

"I have to admit, it looked intimidating," said Alice — a first time shooter. "But it was fun. After the Wall Gun, I wanted to shoot more blackpowder guns!"

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Reserve your spot today for this year's NRA Black Powder Target Rifle Championships. Held August 18-25, the championships are a week of great shooting and great people at the beautiful NRA Whittington Center in Raton, New Mexico.

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Interested in bringing some new programs to your shooting range or club? Then join NRA Clubs and Associations for an upcoming NRA Club Leadership & Development webinar to learn how to start a youth program and how NRA can help you get started. The webinar will also provide an overview of the NRA Competitive Shooting Division's wide range of activities in shooting disciplines, for shooters of all skill levels.

The free one-hour webinar will be held this Thurdsay, March 22 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern. You can register online or check out a listing of other upcoming NRA Club Leadership & Development webinars. Topics are offered to suit any club and offer great advice on how to make your club more successful.

Have a question or a suggestion for webinar topic? Contact NRA Clubs & Associations at 1-800-NRA-CLUB or at clubs@nrahq.org.

Senior Curator Schreier ignites black and smokeless gun powder for History Channel show

Mark and his crew setting up the shot outside NRA Headquarters.

The crew from JWM Productions returned to the National Rifle Association in February to shoot a few followups for a special set to run on History Channel. One of those pieces involved our very own Phil Schreier, Senior Curator at the National Firearms Museum.

Phil's task was the explain the significance of smokeless powder. How moving from black powder not only provided a cleaner shot for the shooter, but also a more efficient one. What better way to do it then with a little demonstration.

National Firearms Museum Senior Curator ready to lite the lines of smokeless and black powder.

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Civil War preservation group to compete with era specific firearms and artillery in Virginia

The North-South Skirmish Association, created in 1950 to honor the soldiers from both sides of the American Civil War, promotes the shooting of Civil War firearms and artillery. But they don't stop there, they also encourage the preservation and display of Civil War materials such as their firearms, the battlefields and the uniforms.

Throughout the year, N-SSA holds "skirmishes" where the units, comprised of fellow association members, compete against each other.

The Spring Nationals, held May 16-20, at Fort Shenandoah, the association's home range, will feature matches for smoothbore, mortar, breechloader, carbine, revolver and more. You might even see a few members of the NRA staff walking around.

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For the past few years the NRA Silhouette National Championships and NRA National Black Powder Target Rifle Championships have been held back to back at the NRA Whittington Center in Raton, New Mexico, throughout the month of July.

That's about to change as the BPTR Championships have moved to August 19-25, still at the NRA Whittington Center, for this coming year.

The decision to move the championship dates was made after a thorough process considering competitor travel schedules and local weather. Although the new dates may conflict with competitors who teach or have young children that must get ready for the new school year, it was ultimately decided that late August fit the needs of the most people based on a forum held at the conclusion of the 2011 championships.

If you've never shot a Black Powder match before and would like to learn more, check out the website for last year's championships or email the Match Director, Jonathan Leighton.

Black Powder is NRA's oldest shooting discipline and is a very fun sport that draws extremely talented and friendly shooters from all over the country. If you can make the trek out to Raton, the Black Powder Target Rifle Championships are definitely worth your while.

NRA Competitive Shooting is releasing a new, more accessible version of its wildly popular conventional tournaments with the NRA Club Champion Challenge.

Today, NRA Competitive Shooting unveiled the “NRA Club Champion Challenge”, a new recreational shooting event for hometown shooting clubs, businesses and civic organizations. These events will be fun, relaxing, and will encourage your members to try a variety of disciplines and courses of fire.

What it is not is a high level competition using state of the art competitive equipment and the use of this equipment should be discouraged. Any club or organization can participate and any range can configure a challenge. NRA membership is not a prerequisite.

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