Reccomend any good books for me?

[Mr. Jonathan]

Hey everyone,

 

So being this time of year and all my wife asks the inevitable question: "What do you want for Christmas this year?"

 

Well that got me thinking, and since a pair of 15x Swaros are little out of budget right now, I was really leaning towards some good classic hunting literature. I really like literature with some class and soul, where its not just a chest beating thing and ranting about B&C or P&Y stuff, but where a trophy is a good representative of the species. I read the man eaters of Tsavo, and some stuff about Fred Bear, and even some titles by Teddy Roosevelt. Can anyone turn me on to some good classic literature, perhaps even about Coues deer?

 

Thanks for the help!

[CouesWhitetail]

I bet Bill Quimby and Outdoor Writer will have some great suggestions for you!

 

Amanda

 

[billrquimby]

Since you liked Maneaters of Tsavo, you may enjoy these on Africa:

 

Hunter by J.A. Hunter -- This is the book that got me interested in hunting in Africa. It was released in 1952, but it's still highly readable.

 

Death In The Long Grass by Peter Hathaway Capstick -- Once you read this one, you'll want the rest of his books -- and you'lll start saving for your first of many African safaris. I got to know Peter before he died and I can truthfully say he is/was the best hunting writer ever -- and that includes Hemingway and Ruark.

 

Use Enough Gun, Honey Badger, Poor No More, Uhuru, and Something of Value by Robert Ruark -- These also are from the 1950s.

 

Any of of the Africana books by Wilbur Smith, southern Africa's answer to America's James Michener.

 

The Covenant by James Michener -- This is a thick novel based on the history of southern Africa, dating back to the arrival of Dutch traders, the first Europeans to reach that part of the continent.

 

McElroy Hunts Dangerous Game by C.J. McElroy -- I ghost wrote this for the founder of Safari Club International a couple of years before he died.

 

The McElroy book is available from Trophy Room Books.com for $125, I think. Hunter's and Capstick's books are under $50. They both are available from SafariPress.com. If Safari Press is out of Hunter, you could try Amazon. Amazon also should have Ruark's, Smith's, and Michener's books.

 

Happy reading.

 

Bill Quimby

[Outdoor Writer]

Amanda asked me to stop by and make a few suggestions. I assume you're basically interested in nonfiction rather than fictional novels, so...

 

I see Bill already recommended Capstick & Ruark, which would have been on my list, especially if you enjoy reading about Africa.

 

You might want to read a few of Jack O'Connor's books on hunting. Below is a complete list of ALL his books in chronologial order. Some are hard to find, but Amazon and other web sites often have readable used copies. You can probably also find a few in your local library.

 

Also, you can read what he had to say about Coues deer in The Deer Hunter's Book, which was put together by Lamar Underwood. Look for Portrait of a Coues Deer on page 15.

 

************************************

Conquest: A Novel of the Old West (1930)

 

Boom Town: A Novel of the Southwestern Silver Boom (1938)

 

Game in the Desert (1939) First published by Derrydale Press in a limited edition of 950 numbered copies, this was reprinted in a 1945 trade edition, with a new preface, under the title Hunting in the South West. In 1977, Amwell Press reissued the book in a limited edition of 950 copies. This version reverted to the original title and included a substantial introduction by O'Connor.

 

Hunting in the Rockies (1947)

 

Sporting Guns (1947)

 

The Rifle Book (1949)

 

Hunting With a Binocular (1949)

 

Sportsman's Arms and Ammunition Manual (1952)

 

The Big-Game Rifle (1952)

 

Jack O'Connor's Gun Book (1953)

 

The Outdoor Life Shooting Book (1957)

 

The Complete Book of Rifles and Shotguns (1961) An updated excerpt from this book was later published as 7-Lesson Rifle Shooting Course.

 

The Big Game Animals of North America (1961)

 

Jack O'Connor's Big Game Hunts (1963) Consists of 26 stories reprinted from Outdoor Life.

 

The Shotgun Book (1965)

 

The Art of Hunting Big Game in North America (1967)

 

Horse and Buggy West: A Boyhood on the Last Frontier (1969) Autobiographical.

 

The Complete Book of Shooting (1969)

 

The Hunting Rifle (1970)

 

Rifle and Shotgun Shooting Basics (1970)

 

Sheep and Sheep Hunting (1974)

 

Game in the Desert Revisited (limited edition of 1,000 copies in 1977, trade edition in 1984)

 

The Best of Jack O'Connor (1977)

 

The Hunter's Shooting Guide (1978)

 

Hunting Big Game (1979)

 

The Last Book: Confessions of an Outdoor Gun Editor (1984) Published posthumously, this autobiography is at times scathing in its frankness and fascinating for the insight it offers into the world of outdoor writing.

 

Hunting on Three Continents With Jack O'Connor (1987)

[CouesWhitetail]

Thanks Tony and Bill!! I am sure those are some great suggestions.

 

Amanda

 

[tommat]

Dang, I'm gonna put some of them on my Santa Lst!

[Mr. Jonathan]

Thanks guys! I really appreciate the recommendations. Tony, my birthday was last week and my wonderful wife got me your book on how to hunt coues deer with Duwane Adams. I pretty much finished that one already, loved the tales in the back. Thanks!

[Jimmer Negamanee]

This thread is pin worthy IMHO. With Bill and Tony making suggestions, you can't go wrong.

[CouesWhitetail]

This thread is pin worthy IMHO. With Bill and Tony making suggestions, you can't go wrong.

 

 

I think you are right, I will pin it.

 

Amanda

 

[KGAINES]

A book I would reccomend would be "The Rivers Ran East" by Leonard Clark

It isn't a book on hunting, but more adventure of his search for the seven cities of cibola. It is a good account of what was encountered in the South American jungles in the 1940's, from man and beast.

 

Thanks for the list Bill and Tony.

[billrquimby]

A book I would reccomend would be "The Rivers Ran East" by Leonard Clark

It isn't a book on hunting, but more adventure of his search for the seven cities of cibola. It is a good account of what was encountered in the South American jungles in the 1940's, from man and beast.

 

Thanks for the list Bill and Tony.

 

I've forgotten the title, but the best book I've read about Coronado's search for the mythical seven cities of Cibola in the American Southwest also was published by the UA Press. It is somewhere around here, and I'll post the name and author when I find it. It was interesting that the expedition took 5,000 men and women across our White Mountains and everyone was close to starving before reaching what now is Eagar/Springerville/St. Johns and they were able to kill antelope. The reports the expedition filed in Spain were extensive, and included information about the animals encountered between Mexico City and Kansas. Amazingly, the hunting parties knew their craft, but no mention was made of any elk seen in Arizona's best elk country. Also interesting was how the fact that Europeans had arrived was transmitted word-of-mouth from the Grand Canyon to Yuma by Indians.

 

A couple of good books on the North America theme are:

 

"One Man, One Rifle, One Land" by J.Y. Jones. He's a southern state's dental surgen turned author of hunting books. This was written after he took all the huntable species and subspecies of big game in North America with his only rifle, a .30-06. He's a quiet, unassuming guy who doesn't brag in person or print, but it took a lot of determination, time, and skill to complete that quest.

 

"The SCI Record Book of Trophy Animals, Americas." New editions come out regularly, and used versions in hardback and paperback are available by searching the 'net. Forget the record entries. It's the text and maps you will want to peruse. I edited the SCI books for 17 years and definitely am biased, but the text and maps that Jack Schwabland of Seattle created are invaluable for any hunter interested in the natural history of big game animals.

 

"Obsessed" by Soudy Golabchi. This book covers Golabchi's lifetime of hunting virtually every type of mountain game on the planet, including his 30 or more hunts on the roof of the world for Marco Polo argalis. My wife knows the guy who ghostwrote it.

 

Bowhunters may like "Howard Hill, The Man And The Legend" by Craig Ekin. It has been out of print for thirty years. It's a biography about Howard Hill and his hunting around the world with his self-made bamboo longbows.

 

If you really are interested in classic and contempory books on hunting and shooting, visit www.safaripress.com or (for Africa) www.trophyroombooks.com There are other publishers of hunting books, but these are the best in my mind.

 

I could go on and on. I've been collecting books on hunting and natural history for six decades, and for a time publishers sent me books to review for the Tucson Citizen or Safari magazine. My office and trophy room are lined with bookcases, and there are stacks of books in the corners. I have only counted them by the foot, but there must be at least 2,000 of them. I've read them all and I'm reading some of the best again. I've more than 50 mounts of animals, but I could give them all away and not regret it. Can't say the same about my collection of books!

 

Bill Quimby

[Snapshot]

 

.

 

 

 

A couple of good books on the North America theme are:

 

"One Man, One Rifle, One Land" by J.Y. Jones. He's a southern state's dental surgen turned author of hunting books. This was written after he took all the huntable species and subspecies of big game in North America with his only rifle, a .30-06. He's a quiet, unassuming guy who doesn't brag in person or print, but it took a lot of determination, time, and skill to complete that quest.

 

 

Bill Quimby

 

It's funny you should mention it Bill, I pulled J.Y Jones Book off the shelf to read last night!

 

My Dad has a small collection of good books including the entire Capstick and most Ruark, but my stepmother is an evil woman and I doubt she will ever let me have them.

 

[KGAINES]

Bill is this the book you are thinking about.

"Coronado's March In Search Of The Seven Cities Of Cibola And Discussion Of Their Probable Location"

J. H. Simpson

 

If not let me know what it is because I will probably read it.

 

 

Mr. Jonathan

If you like the mystery style books, the ones written by C.J. Box are for the most part themed around hunting and the outdoors, with murder and mayhem thrown in, Outdoor Writer mentioned them and I have read every one so far.

 

For a comedic twist to the outdoor books read the books about Tom Brown jr., good books, but it seems a lot of embellishment takes place in these.

[yotebuster]

One that I'm working on right now for the 4th time is "Meditations on Hunting" by Jose Ortega y Gasset. It is a MUST Read for all hunters in my opinion. y Gasset was a spanish philosopher in the 1940's that did works on all sorts of crap, but he really hit a home run when he wrote this one, he was a non-hunter, but wanted to understand the drive that humans have to hunt. It is an incredible book, fairly short, and full of insight on exactly why we love to do what we do. I like being fluent in it cause you can make any nonhunter look like a complete jack_ss using your brain rather then anger, you all should seriously check it out. And no he doesn't state that we are primordle hunters trying to break free of a shell, but rather that we've picked hunting as a sport to retreat to from the daily grind of our lives. This really helped me in my quest to figure out whether I was truly doing the right thing by trophy hunting, and it truly is a natural thing to trophy hunt, handicap ourselves (ex. bows) etc.

[hunter4life]

If you are from NM or just like hunting stories from the old days then the following books are must reads.

 

Elliott S. Barker wrote the following two books.

 

When the dogs bark treed: A year on the trail of the longtails

Beatty's Cabin: Adventures in the Pecos High Country

 

Montague Stevens wrote the following book about hunting grizzlies in SW NM.

 

Meet Mr. Grizzly

 

Frank Dobie wrote the following book about a hunter that spent a lot of time hunting lions and bears in the Southwest.

 

The Ben Lilly Legend