Where to begin - where to begin...
The inspiration was right outside my bedroom window in the cornfields and woods around my home in the very early 1950's. Pheasant hunters marching down our corn rows at daybreak - staccato sounds of gunshots all around and the sweet acrid smell of burnt powder filled the air. I watched them from my upstairs bedroom window at four years old as these sights, sounds and scents etched themselves into my memory.
Soon after this we learned that our neighbor, Larry Darling and his son Charlie, were upland hunters in every sense of the word and hunted over "Pepper", a white-heavily speckled with black English Pointer and a very good bird dog. They recognized my interest right away and took me and my Dad under wing and introduced us to hunting, fishing and trapping.
It was Larry that I brought the Trojan I borrowed from a school-mate when I was twelve to ask hin if the old thing was safe to shoot. "Safe to shoot!?!? - I'll say it is! Nobody ever made a better one!"
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