Paper: Complex developed for Ohio trapshooters

The Cleveland Plain Dealer is reporting that the new home of Ohio trapshooting is nearing completion.

From the story:

[Jack] Fishburn, 72, born and raised in Grafton in Lorain County, agreed last year to invest his time and $1.6 million to create a home for the Ohio State Trapshooting Association (OSTA) at his Cardinal Center Campground. It was needed after the Amateur Trapshooting Association closed its longtime grounds in Vandalia, near Dayton, and moved the prestigious Grand American Trapshooting Tournament to a sparkling new $36 million complex in southern Illinois.

The OSTA has tradition of its own. It is holding the 120th edition of its clay target championships June 20-25. With the Vandalia complex shuttered, the group has scrambled to find a suitable range.

The answer was Fishburn's Cardinal Center Campground bordering I-71 in Marengo, about a half-hour north of downtown Columbus.

The story reports that a long line of 40 trap fields, about a mile of roads, a shooting center, parking and a developed strip for dozens of shooting industry exhibitors are now rising from a Morrow County cornfield, and that Fishburn also refurbished the down-on-its-luck campground he purchased after it had been idle for a decade.

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Again, from the story:

The ODNR Ohio Division of Wildlife provided the OSTA with $150,000 for voice-activated trap machines and equipment. Fishburn and his crews have done the rest.

"Heck, the concrete plant stayed open on Sundays just for us," said Fishburn, a man who always wears a smile. "The men have really pitched in, as well as my son, Dan, and daughter, Denise Aumend. You should have seen this place a month ago. You'd have bet we couldn't do it."

But they could, and they did.

"Whatever it takes, we'll be ready," said foreman Kevin Dunaway, walking a mud and gravel road soon to be clogged with trapshooters.

We can almost hear "if you build it, they will come" whispering over the rural Morrow County countryside.