Schuyler Helbing is assuming the proportions of an Annie Oakley legend. Last August, at Camp Perry, Ohio, she pulled off a hat trick, taking her third straight title in the women's smallbore prone division. She then bagged her first "junior title" competing against young men. Schuyler turned 17 before the meet had ended, two full years before she will graduate from the "junior" category.

She was taught to shoot by her stepfather John Chapman, a wholesale meat dealer in Fort Worth, Tex., who sidelines in gunsmithery for the likes of the U.S. Olympic team. At 14 Schuyler was the youngest woman ever named to the NRA's topflight "Randall Team."

A senior at Fort Worth's Weatherford High School, Schuyler plans to pursue a college career in psychology, which may be just as well. This year her sister Chandler, aged 12, made the top NRA team—two years earlier than Schuyler did.

Carmen Balthrop's New York debut as leading lady in the Scott Joplin opera Treemonisha was delayed by the Broadway musicians' strike, but, then, Treemonisha itself has withstood over 60 years of neglect since the king of ragtime penned it. "The right people have heard us, and we will pull out," assures Balthrop, whose performance as Treemonisha, a sort of black, female Moses, drew raves from Washington critics when the opera was presented at Kennedy Center. She adds serenely, "The magic of Joplin's music will make it live."

A 23-year-old D.C. native with an M.A. in music from Catholic University, Carmen began singing along as a tot to opera her father listened to on the radio. Last spring she won the prestigious Metropolitan Opera auditions.

A vegetarian and yoga enthusiast who jogs as much as eight miles a day, Carmen has simple ambitions. "Sing, sing, sing," she laughs, revealing a charming gap between her two front teeth. "That's the best thing I can do. I don't knit too well and I'm not very good at tennis."

Robert Marshall, a 17-year-old London schoolboy, likes challenging games—especially about war. But he's not all blood and guts. There's also room in his expansive imagination for Elves, Hobbits, Ores, the Rider of Rohan—and many of the other creatures who dwell in the pages of his favorite books, J.R.R. Tolkien's fantastical trilogy, The Lord of the Rings. Melding his twin passions, Marshall has recently invented a board game named after the trilogy which United Artists may license for distribution. Opposing factions battle to move the magic "ring" over a map of Middle-earth. Victory is achieved when a player successfully moves the ring to the Mount of Doom. Marshall, who is currently studying math and economics at the all-male Alleyn's School, plans to become a chartered accountant—a skill which will come in handy if the game sells half as well as the Tolkien trilogy. "It's for anybody who likes Tolkien and games," proclaims the young inventor. "You don't have to read the books."