Fishing and Shooting Sketches
 

This came in the mail today a first edition of Fishing and Shooting Sketches by Grover Cleveland. I want to say thanks to Garry L Gordon for recommending it, I am going to try and sit down and read through it soon. So far I have read a little of his view on rabbit hunting, right off the bat his way of using insults gave me a good laugh. One line in particular sounds like something Clint Eastwood would say in a western. The book looks to be in decent shape the only fading is on one of the first pages the rest looks crisp.

Uh, Oh...we have a budding book collector :corn:(and Big Bore Master!).

good reading ....I have to get this book to if I can find it...old grover was quite a big man in size at least...charlie

Charlie theres a few different reprints in the $20-$60 range with some being leather bound. So far I am enjoying Cleveland's writings I dont know much about him. There are a few sentences that have stood out to me to paraphrase a bit
" Any loafer I meet with a dog and gun I consider a friend". He does have some very strong opinions that not everyone will agree with but I still find enjoyment with his words if not for anything else you can tell he was extremely passionate about the pursuit of waterfowl.

I seem to recall that Cleveland owned and shot a Lefever, yes?

The big bore stuff definitely has a learning curve to it which I doubt most hunters of my generation will take interest in. I guess I feel a bit obligated to these old big guns because once their current caretakers pass I think the majority of them wont see the outside of a gun safe again. Any big gun I own I will carry them in the field if hulls are hard to come by in the future I will buy brass ones if plastic wads follow suit I will load fiber if lead goes away I will eat the cost and shoot bismuth. I just turned 29 recently and hope to carry the big bores for at least a couple decades in the field.

I could see acquiring a few more books such as this one. In one of the sketches im 99% sure it is of a LC Smith the side plates look identical to one. He mentions shooting shore birds in Cape Cod during the summer, What birds would these have been ?

I know Josh has that Lefever 8 gauge that is linked to Cleveland but he also owned a Colt 1883 8 gauge. I have heard he actually owned 2 of the Colts but never seen a source backing that up. I think Cleveland owned different brands of American doubles he mentions carrying a sub gauge gun along with fishing rod for when he saw shore birds while out fishing. I wonder if perhaps he found English guns pretentious as he seemed to held some contempt for wealthy sportsmen or I guess more accurately wealthy dandies.

There were many varieties of birds that were hunted without season or limit -- dowitchers, sandpipers, snipe, willets, etc. As an aside, plover on toast was fine dining, indeed. I saw a recipe for greater yellow legs in an old (mid-19th C.) hunting book. In Kansas, meadowlarks were shot, as were robins. In our recent Parker Pages there's an account of eating stew made with redwing blackbirds. Snipe was one of the more common targets until their numbers dropped so much that the season was closed. It's hard to imaging just how much wildlife there was in America, and how inexhaustible it seemed at the time.

I'm really glad to see you take up the banner for those old big bore guns, Milton. Keep up the good work!

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You need this gun!

The page before Cleveland writing about summer shore birds does show what I think is a sketch of a snipe but he doesnt mention it specifically. Would you happen to know of any books that are about the origins of what or why certain birds are considered game birds? Its something I have wondered about what makes a game bird a game bird and another species a non game bird?