Daily News -- Sunshine Division Shoot at Portland Gun Club -- Feb. 22, 1931. Photo by. . . [Panoramic silver gelatin photo showing the Sunshine Division volunteers lined up for a 1931 charity fund-raising event].

[Portland, OR: Sunshine Division, Portland Police Bureau, 1931]. One large silver gelatin sepia-tinted panoramic photo, sized 34.75 x 8 in., text in lower part of image, excellent contrast (minor creasing, slight wear, minor spotting & toning in couple spots), still VG image with excellent contrast. This souvenir panoramic picnic photo was taken of the Sunshine Division volunteers at their charity shooting event in February, 1931. The image shows police officers, men and women in Jazz Age Dress, men in knickers and argyle socks, and several holding shotguns. Founded in 1922 by Portland City Mayor George Baker who had been forced to lay off 40 police officers due to the recession, he gathered volunteer civilians to serve in emergency situations. The group quickly became dubbed “George Baker’s Sunshine Boys” as they spread sunshine to the households they visited and left food and funds. together with the KGW radio variety show the “Hoot Owls” they solicited funds during a segment, or division of the program and by the late 1920s were known as the Sunshine Division. The Police Reserve Volunteers gathered food, collected funds, held fund raisers, and operated out of the East Precinct station at SE 7th & Alder in Portland. The Portland Gun Club was organized in January, 1907 at the old Irvington Racetrack behind the race horse barns for trap shooting. By 1913 they had relocated to their current location with 30 acres on the east end of Powell Boulevard. See: Lori S. Kuechler, The Portland Police Sunshine Division: An Early History (2003).