A Bullet Worthy of Jack
I opened the ancient brown paper bag and poured a few bullets into my hand, looking to see what I was going to be working with. I couldn’t believe my eyes for a moment... I was holding a bullet that I had read about for over 30 years, one that I had never thought to...
Take a Hike
Hiking is full of adventures and sights. Just the other day I noticed Mike was filling a daypack and lacing up his Irish Setter hiking boots. Great, we were going hiking! Hope he packed a gun because the mountains around here are now full of grizzlies, wolves and...
Ring of Spears
At last the tense ring was complete, and the spearmen rose and closed in. The next day, we moved camp to the edge of a swamp about five miles from the river. Near the tents was one of the trees which, not knowing its real name, we called "sausage-tree"; the seeds or...
Wildlife in Motion
When it comes to portraying animals in motion, many wildlife art experts agree that Schatz has few peers — if any. He is among western Europe's most renowned wildlife artists. His paintings, some of which sell for as much as $40,000, have been displayed in several...
Mr Tutt is No Gentleman
"A gentleman!" repeated Quelch sarcastically. "Will you kindly inform me in what respect a person calling himself a gentleman differs from anyone else?" Mr. Ephraim Tutt had just come out of the clubhouse and was standing, rod in hand, on the bank of the Santapedia...
Giant of the South Seas
"Sharks!" I yelled, hauling away for dear life. Time is probably more generous and healing to an angler than to any other individual. The wind, the sun, the open, the colors and smells, the loneliness of the sea or the solitude of the stream work some kind of magic....
Happy 4th of July
Happy 4th! But mind your hunting dogs — they may mistake those sky booms for downed birds! While you hoomans are celebrating the 4th of July, you kinda miss the meaning of freedom. You have jobs, payments and so many daily and life obligations. Ugh. For dogs, however,...
Roland Clark The Varied Artist
Roland Clark's love of excellence extended beyond duck portraiture. More than other hunters, waterfowlers are men sustained by memory and promise. In the icy silence of the marsh, when a world of water and sky hangs suspended between darkness and daylight, a man looks...
Tinkhamtown
He was going back to Tinkhamtown. It was a long way, but he knew where he was going. He would follow the road through the woods and over the crest of a hill and down the hill to the stream, and cross the sagging timbers of the bridge, and on the other side would be...
Disrupter Electronic Ear Buds Available
Walker’s Disrupter electronic ear buds are now available both in-store and online nationwide. Walker's latest, the Disrupter electronic ear buds, are now available for purchase — upping the ante by delivering reliable noise protection and sound quality required...
Theodore Roosevelt and A Great Adventure
Roosevelt had said, "I want Uncle Sam to have a better African collection than anybody else"; he accomplished his purpose. Well-known African explorer-hunter Carl Akeley, a contemporary of Theodore Roosevelt, had a simple answer about why Roosevelt's African...
Season 5 Premiers this Week
The world’s most watched outdoor television series returns for its fifth season on Outdoor Channel this week through the end of 2023. Sporting Classics with Chris Dorsey is a joint venture between Dorsey Pictures, the largest producer of outdoor lifestyle programming...
Get a Job
Due to the cost of dog food — Mike has informed me I must get a job. Well, the other day Mike was grumbling — again. When I walked by, he pressed a receipt for a bag of dog food in my face. Seems that the price of dog food that was only $60/bag a couple of years back...
Voice of the Outdoors Curt Gowdy
Curt Gowdy left a legacy that will never be equaled. Baseball broadcasts would run spring to fall; football carried from fall to winter and basketball into the spring. But Sunday afternoons from January to March, with snow packed at the foot of millions of doors, part...
The Saga of Cobb Island
This article originally appeared in the 2018 Summer issue of Sporting Classics Magazine. Click here to learn more about Wings of Wonder, a beautiful 327-page book detailing the remarkable story of the Cobb Family. Featuring more than 200 decoys and hundreds of...
Caught on Canvas
"I don't deliberately try to make my paintings look different from other people's, but maybe one of the reasons they do is because I don't consciously imitate anyone artist's approach." Assuming that you buy Mark Susinno's explanation, it is conceivable to believe...
A Typical Success Story
Bob Bertram is somewhat of an a typical success story — a man who is surprisingly talented at more than one calling. Bob Bertram has come a long way since cut school; he studied fine art and commercial illustration at Murray State University, class of 1984. But today...
Sparkplug Marlin
About that time it dawned on me that we had probably made a bad decision! Many years I owned and operated several huntingpreserves.in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Now that I'm retired, my wife Rita and I spend our Winters in Rincon de Guayabito, a small resort village...
History from A Duck Blind
Nash Buckingham (1880-1971) was, in his day and still now, one of the most renowned and best-loved outdoor writers to ever ply the trade. The Limb Dodger was overdue. Concern mounted, and talk had already turned to possible causes of why the train had not bumped and...
Nosler Releases K-Can Suppressor
Short, Light and Quiet – Nosler Adds K-Can to Suppressor Line Nosler Inc. announces their new SR-30K suppressor. Templated from Nosler’s SR-30AlTi — boasting the lightest possible weight due to its aluminum and titanium construction — the SR-30K (aka. K-Can) finds the...
Ruby
Ruby was the original Terminator. As a puppy she proved to be too much for inside the house, and almost too much for the outside. I have never seen a dog so fast, or so muscled or so hard; indeed, I believe you could have hit her anywhere on her body with a broom...
Benelli USA Limited Edition Lupo KAOS
In defiance of the conventional assembly line protocols, Benelli is believes you can only have ONE finish on your Lupo rifle — because no two are alike! Benelli USA is introducing the limited edition Lupo KAOS, a high-performance bolt-action rifle that showcases a...
They Smell Like Fish
When the house starts smelling like fish, I know summer has begun. Well, I can tell summer has arrived because Mike’s friends are arriving with frequency at my house — and they all smell like fish, har har! Of course, each of them has enough gear to open their own fly...
Two Sports
Men of remarkable talent and courage, Er Shelley and Paul Rainey brought a unique form of hunting to Africa. As the 20th century dawned, the gamelands near Memphis beckoned two very different young men. One was a pointing dog trainer from rural Michigan, uncannily...
The Elusive Southern Appalachian Brook Trout
AKA: Brookies, Squaretails, Specs, Natives, etc. The following is an excerpt from Fly Fishing the Blue Ridge Parkway By Sam R. Johnson. For the first time, fly fishing savant Sam Johnson has captured in one guide an incredible “bucket list” of over 210 of the most...
A Thing of Dying
In the 89th year of his being, Ben Willow had died where most completely he had lived, upon the hills of home, with a dog and a gun. A little less than midway through this book, iron-willed old Missouri-West Virginian Ben Willow throws himself mercilessly once more...
New! The Jon Boat Years by Jim Mize
New Book Release! The Jon Boat Years: And Other Stories Afield with Fine Friends, Fair Dogs, a Shotgun, and a Fly Rod Softcover, 175 Pages. Delightful tales of hunting and fishing, family, friends, dogs, and precious time well spent. Nationally recognized and...
Bill Cypress
We thought Bill Cypress was as close to perfection as human beings ever got. State Highway 16 ran south out of town. Not straight south — not to start, anyway. It had to work its way out of the hills first and make a couple of gentle turns past the new high school...
Chris Dorsey on Fox News
Sporting Classics TV host Chris Dorsey joins Fox News to talk hunting and conservation. Chris Dorsey joined Fox News Tonight host Joey Jones to discuss the many differences between green environmental groups and conservation organizations...and who does more for the...
The Annual Party
As you are reading this, one of the biggest events in America has come and gone — my birthday. That is the day when Mike fires up the grill, tosses on the steaks, bakes some potatoes and serves me a helping of each. Normally crowds of folks arrive to chew on the...
A Great and Tainted Genius
There’s the greatest writer of the last century and wanderings across the continents with gun and rod, and it begins in 1951 just outside Havana Way up in the Sawtooths, the day comes creeping on the wind. The aspens rattle and the stars fade as the first light hits...
Mournful Echoes
“…before I could gather my feet under me I felt a boot on my neck.”
When Older Men Gather Around
After an unsuccessful day in my stand on Thanksgiving Day, my daughter and I drove the next morning back to the Philly suburbs where I was born and raised. I suppose I’ll always call that place home, although Lynchburg, Virginia where I now live is becoming more and...
No Such Thing as a Bad Day Fishing
The bumper sticker read: A bad day fishing is better than a good day at work. I was sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic wondering how I had allowed myself to get in such a frustrating situation. Like all of the other miserable souls around me, I was growing more...
A Fishy Tale
In my youth, I chanced to date a girl whose family had a cabin on a lake. The lake was Bay Lake, just north of sprawling Mille Lacs Lake in central Minnesota. Going to the cabin was an escape from reality. Annie’s father took good care of the place, and when we made...
Zane Grey’s Guns
Zane Grey, who became one of America’s most successful authors, hunted the "Tonto Rim" of Arizona for most of a decade with Model 1895 Winchesters in .30 Government (.30-06). What Zane Grey termed the Tonto Rim in Arizona is officially the Mogollon Rim, named for Juan...
RIA Premier May Auction
Rock Island Auction Co. gavels in $22 million in May! Rock Island Auction Company (RIAC) brought in $22 million in sales at its Premier Auction of 2023, which took place May 19-21! Featuring the Beaumont-Adams revolver surrendered by Confederate President Jefferson...
Spotted Horse on the Windy Prairie
Sporting Classics Assistant Editor-Digital, Adam C. Trawick, went with Byers Media to take a couple toms off the windy prairies of South Dakota. It was a brutal, gale-force driven 26 degrees Fahrenheit that smacked us as we stepped foot onto the muddy grounds of the...
Youth Field Trial Alliance
A Cause We Can All Get Behind I want to give a shout-out to a relatively new organization whose presence on the sporting landscape can’t be viewed as anything but a good thing: the Youth Field Trial Alliance. The brainchild of Chris Mathan, the human dynamo behind...
Sporting Classics Bourbon Rock Glasses
Made from premium full-grain leather our new bourbon rock glasses feature robust stitching and solid brass rivets for a secure hold. Engraved with our signature Sporting Classics logo these glasses are something you'll be proud to put on your bar. Each leather wrap...
The Big Predators
With lions, wolves and grizzlies on the increase, I may start wearing a bulletproof vest when I go to these remote areas. I like hiking in fields and forests to sniff about for deer, elk, birds and rodents. Now, however, I must look over my shoulder and stay alert for...
Join Us at Griffin & Howe June 2-4, 2023
Join Sporting Classics and many other fine exhibitors as we help Griffin & Howe celebrate its 100-year anniversary, the 25-year anniversary of Hudson Farm and grand opening of the new Griffin & Howe Showroom! The Anniversary Showcase runs on Friday June 2nd,...
Jim Fender’s African Book Collection
Click Here to View All An inveterate reader with wide-ranging interests, Jim Fender has spent a lifetime collecting and reading books in a wider variety of areas. In many senses a reader of the “old school” (someone with wide-ranging interests and a willingness to...
A Great Double Barrel Shotgun That’s Affordable
With the Autumn, Fabarm is filling a hole in the shotgun market with an eminently satisfying double barrel shotgun that's affordable. It’s a peculiar thing, but for many years, newly made, well-constructed double barrel shotguns have been as scarce as the legendary...
Perspectives On Hunting Myself
I, as often as not, enjoy the day when nothing happens, like a nothing day I spent on a deer stand. A friend of mine told me that an old wrangler in Montana had expressed it best when he said "the thing that a man hunts when he hunts is himself." I don't know when...
MTM CASE-GARD’s The Bull Rifle Rest
MTM Case-Gard has made a name for itself with innovative polymer-based solutions for shooting and hunting enthusiasts. Now, it expands its shooting support system offerings with The Bull rifle rest. Built similar in design to the company's popular K-Zone shooting...
Nosler Introduces Carbon Chassis Hunter Rifle
Nosler Inc. recently announcd the new Carbon Chassis Hunter, Nosler’s first chassis rifle system. This rifle provides benefits that you’d expect from Nosler including V-block bedding, LOP and comb adjustments and detachable magazine with AICS compatibility that come...
SAUER 100 Rifles Feature H-S Precision Stocks
J.P. Sauer and Sohn now offers SAUER 100 LWT (lightweight) and Pantera XT rifles with H-S Precision stocks. These are the first SAUER rifles available with the technically advanced American-made H-S Precision stock featuring a 7075-aluminum bedding block with Kevlar,...
Fiocchi Poised to Knock Down Big Game
Presented in a wide range of the most popular hunting calibers, Fiocchi Knock Down blends premium components with a precision-engineered monolithic bullet design for decisive terminal performance on big game. Part of Fiocchi's EnviroShield technology, Knock Down...
New Burris Laser Rangefinding Binoculars
Experienced hunters and shooters know that a solid pair of binos is a must-have piece of equipment. Whether still-hunting or evaluating game at distance, quality binoculars significantly put the odds of success in your favor. Equally important is the ability to range...