Sporting Notes

tom turpin
The closest a writer comes to immortality—having words and thoughts enclosed between hard covers. These three books, plus a complete collection of Gun Digest from the mid-80s onwards, will give you the breadth of Tom Turpin’s work.

Lives, Deaths, Eras, and Random Thoughts

As you might have read here, in a note by Dave Petzal, the rifle world…
Volumes that should be found on every outdoorsman’s bookshelf. And in case you’re wondering, I have never found a single female who enjoyed reading Jack London. No idea why. Maude Brewster, the heroine of The Sea-Wolf, is eminently admirable.

Perfection Revisited

Beginning with my sojourn in high school, which was never yesterday, as Robert Ruark would…
purdey gun
Fantasy engraving by Aristide Barre, unusual for 1912. Courtesy Rock Island Auction Company

Rock Island Preview

Rock Island’s second premier auction to be held at its new premises in Texas is…
Volume One, Issue 1 (left) with a painting by Chet Reneson on the cover, and our November, 2023 issue, sporting a painting by Brett James Smith. If that cover is not timeless, what is?

Timeless (II)

According to Oxford, the definition of elegance, dating from 1797, is “refined tastefulness.”
audley house
The home of James Purdey & Sons since the 1880s, Audley House, on South Audley Street—at one time, Beau Brummell lived on that street in Mayfair.

Timeless (I)

It is a truth universally acknowledged—at least among those who have it—that you can’t buy…
Garmin Xero C1 Pro chronograph—smaller than a box of ammunition, a third the weight, and usable under all conditions. What more could you ask?

Another Garmin Breakthrough

As a general rule, new technology is not at the top of my list to…
Gray’s shooting editor, looking the part at least.

Obsession

Obsession is one of that sad list of words, along with paranoid and amazing, which…
James Woodward & Sons double rifle (.450 Express 3¼) probably made for Woodward by Alexander Henry, around 1874.

Image. Imagery. Imagine…

One of my favorite times of year is the week between Christmas and New Year’s. …
To put a Frenchman on the label of a bottle of South African wine may get a mixed reception, but we are assured the wine (from limited production by Ivan Volschenk in the Cape) is excellent.

APHA Mail

This just in, as we used to say in radio when an urgent bulletin landed…
This boxlock shotgun by John Graham & Co., of Inverness, is about as plain as a British boxlock can be, and its engraving is minimal, to say the least. But it may owe its continued existence to that little bit of adornment, and it is a good, solid gun.

Aesthetics

Show the average person a Walker Colt—none of which were engraved, most of which were…
Wieland’s old friend, George Calef, in the Yukon in 2008. George was then in his mid-60s, and strolled around with a heavy pack like it was nothing. Those twigs you see sticking out of the pack were firewood to fuel our little ‘ZZ’ stove.

Take the Long Way ‘Round

We’ve posted here several pieces on physical fitness for various types of hunting, with specialized…
Wieland’s favorite page from Donald Dallas’s 2008 masterpiece, The British Sporting gun and Rifle. The shotgun is an Adams-patent Purdey underlever, typical of the superb illustrations that add so much to a book that is already extraordinary.

A Shotgunner’s Essential Library

There’s nothing quite like moving your home, office, gun room, and library to bring home…