Letters

The Good, the Bad & the Ugly

I've just read "Confederate Grouse," by Tred Slough (Jan/Feb). Now there's a man who has something to say! And how well he says it! A much needed and timely contrast to the horrible scenes deplored by Bob Hafey in his letter, "A Rant for Restraint," in that issue. Here's a hearty "Well done!" to writer and to correspondent and to you, the Editor, for printing both, thereby showing that, despite the higher visibility of the bad and the ugly, the good remains alive and well. Few in the latter camp, however, have expressed themselves as well as has Slough in "Confederate Grouse." Not many could. But, certainly, more of us could take a stand against the slobbish behavior described by Hafey that has given all hunters a poor image in the minds of the non-hunting public. I don't know who sponsors this garbage on television, because I don't watch it, but I hope I'm not guilty of buying their stuff!

John Cadwalader
Woodville, Virginia


More Support for a Rant

I would like to add my rant to that of Bob Hafey's. As in the US, there is considerable backlash here in Canada against folks who hunt. The last thing we need is the "snuff" programs Hafey is talking about. But, as well, your magazine needs to take some of the flak for this. On pages 113 to 116 of that issue you run an "advertisement" in which a collection of smiling idiots is pictured squatting behind a stack of doves. In "Dispatches From Hungary" you show us a field of dead birds. What is the point of these pictures? They certainly do not depict game hunted for and successfully taken in the field. They are shots of a slaughter. Birds driven or contained in a staged area for the "sport" of the shooting public. Excuse me while I barf.

Your magazine is without equal in the quality of production and wonderful stories like "Confederate Grouse." As an owner of a Beretta Silver Snipe for the past 40-odd years, I also love double guns. But I have a hard time getting my mind around folks who fly south to shoot 2,000 rounds at birds "because it is legal!" Where is the sport in that?

We need stories of the wild-writers with the feeling of O'Connor, Trueblood or Andy Russell. Men and women who have lived and experienced the outdoors and have the knowledge and intuition to respect nature for what the natural world is. It is interesting in one of your recent articles, "Ithaca's Economy Doubles" [Nov/Dec '06], that you show an ad for Ithaca Guns including the "extinct passenger pigeon." Surely you can make the leap from passenger pigeons to those doves in South America.

As a gun magazine for those of us who love our doubles, you have no equal. I can only hope that you will see the light in how you depict the "hunt."

Bob Hutt
Via e-mail


There is, indeed, a difference between "shooting" and "hunting," just as there is between "released" and "wild," "walked up" and "driven," "sport" and "subsistence" . . . . It's easy to cast aspersions based on hearsay and photographs, but making leaps based on assumptions can be dangerous. For one man's take on the ethics of our sport, see Michael McIntosh's Shooting column (p. 30). For another man's thoughts on flying south to shoot at birds, see Ralph Stuart's "Wild in Argentina" (p. 70).

As for extirpating doves in South America, don't worry too much about it. That's not going to happen anytime soon.


Praise for Cole & Kolar

I share Ed Carroll's admiration of Rich Cole and his team at Cole Gunsmithing ("Cole Gunsmithing Revolutionizes Custom Stockmaking," Jan/Feb). A few years ago Rich and his team invisibly repaired a cracked Beretta stock I was sure was lost and, more recently, they fit one of my older Beretta actions with 28-gauge barrels and new fancy wood, resulting in a gun that both turns heads at the gun club and took a limit of pheasants in Kansas last year. However, the title of Carroll's recent article on Cole's new CNC stockmaking process implicitly gives Cole credit for introducing this great practice when, in fact, Kolar Arms, of Racine, Wisconsin, has been offering custom CNC-machined stocks on its competition over/unders for a number of years.

In the summer of 2002 I purchased my first Kolar gun and visited the plant to pick the wood and have the stock fitted, which included CNC machining of the shape and final fitting and tweaking by hand, similar to Cole's process described in Carroll's article. The resulting stock was not only beautiful but also fit exactly, a welcome relief from years of adjustable combs and butts to fit my six-four frame. At the time, the custom stockfitting was included in the price of the standard gun.

Later, in the fall of 2004, I found a great deal on a Kolar Sporter at DuPont/ K-guns and, using Kolar's measurements taken off the 2002 stock, was able to have an exact duplicate stock made for the new gun without attending another fitting.

Although the scope of SSM clearly is focused on fine field guns, you do include a sporting clays column and occasionally review sporting clays guns. Some of your readers even shoot competitively (when we can't hunt!). Perhaps you will consider doing a story on Kolar as an example of excellent American boutique gunmaking in a future issue.

J.D. Schmisseur
Leesburg, Virginia


Training Memories

The feature "Old School," by Tom Davis [Sept/Oct '06] brought back wonderful memories of growing up with the Hogans and Lorenzes in Barrington, Illinois. Tom Davis captured the colorful world of these professional trainers, their families and their dedication to the breeds. I clearly remember the impeccably dressed men and women, English double guns and kennels filled with well-behaved retrievers and flushers. The stories of the Hogans as estate managers in Wigglesworth, England, up near the Yorkshire Dales and bringing Labs to the US still amaze me.

My Uncle Frank Hogan; his father, Martin; and Dave Lorenz were revered as almost Gods by my father. I spent many idyllic days during the summer at the Hogan kennels in Barrington and Hayward, Wisconsin, and was in constant demand by Thomas Howell and James Lamb Free as a bird boy or kennel sweeper. When legendary trainers like Cotton Pershall or Dave Elliot stopped by, the kennels boys were given "cotton" for our ears and told "to be seen and not heard," but we still listened as these legends talked of dogs, fine guns and bird hunting.

The Hogans and Lorenzes were the best living heroes a boy could wish for. Martin and Frank Hogan often carried their "priest" with them-an oak hand-carved slingshot that they could do wonders with on "poison blinds." They trained their dogs in the pre-electronics days and brought out the best in working dogs with methods that B.F. Skinner would approve.

Thanks for the memories.

Patrick Maxon
Reno, Nevada

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