Paul Mauser: The Man Who Repurposed the Door Latch

Paul Mauser: The Man Who Repurposed the Door Latch

His rifles armed world powers in titanic wars, and hunters in the greatest game fields on Earth. The spoor, braided at first, was unraveling. “Ready to bed,” John mouthed the words. Short yards ahead, a patch of dried mud came to eye—two feet off the ground....
Roosevelt the Rifleman

Roosevelt the Rifleman

With horse and rifle he explored frontiers, indulging a lust that would transcend politics.  Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. defined the bully pulpit, spared the teddy bear and led the strenuous life. “I do not believe,” he declared in a late retrospective, “that any...
Aiming At Night

Aiming At Night

Still in the dark about night vision and thermal sights and gobbledegook thereof? To enlighten… The feral pig appeared with the first stars. I was already hiking to the car. A quick sit steadied the rifle; but the reticle vanished in night’s shadows and the boar...
The Indefatigable Charles Newton

The Indefatigable Charles Newton

“Ahead of his time” falls short. His tenacity matched his genius. But war and the Depression would have their way. When rifle maker Buzz Fletcher asked me to photograph a Mauser he’d stocked, I said, “Sure!” Would I like some 256 Newton brass to check it on the range?...
The Extraordinary Howard Hill

The Extraordinary Howard Hill

Viewed from the end, an imbedded arrow is an obscenely small mark, cleaving it the stuff of fairy tales. But film director William Keighley wasn’t working on a cartoon. He needed that arrow split. For real. On camera.  Who better than an archer who shot as if drawing...
Reticles That Help You Hit

Reticles That Help You Hit

When I fired my first shot with a centerfire rifle, only about half of all hunters used scopes. Offhand, squinting down the Krag’s long barrel and struggling to hold it up, I tugged the trigger. The report savaged my ears, the steel butt my clavicle. The oil can on...
Alvin Biesen: Riflemaker of the Coalyards

Alvin Biesen: Riflemaker of the Coalyards

Years ago, sweating, prone, almost out of time and watching mirage slow to a crawl through the 20x Redfield, I shaded downwind just out of the X-ring and caught it. “Good call,” came a voice behind the line. I rolled over, slid the bolt open on the Remington and...