Buy one and enjoy it. Thanks to the expertise of Bill Quimby as an editor and writer, this is a most enjoyable read. I am half way through now and sorry I had not started it sooner.

Shame the poor response to this post. There is no one man who has done more to further the hunting community than Mac.

I have McElroy hunts Asia, also good!

A few interesting things about McElroy Hunts Asia:

The only publisher he approached rejected it, and with good reason. The manuscript was too light for a book, and what was there required major editing and some rewriting.

I'd just signed a contract to produce SCI's magazine and record books when Mac brought it to me. I fleshed it out as much as I could, then designed the book using lots of large photos to make up for the scarcity of text (and to make it resemble his McElroy Hunts Africa), worked with a printer in Tucson to get it published, and produced his ads to market it.

He wanted 5,000 copies; I said 1,000 was a better number, and we wound up printing 2,000. He sold a few and then lost interest. He still had a pile of boxes in his garage when he ran out of money when his payments from SCI for going away ended, so he sold them to Safari Press.

Mac apparently forgot I was a contractor and not an SCI employee, so he didn't offer to pay me for my time and I was so green I didn't send him a bill. He more than paid me back with favors over the years of our association after that, however, including getting me to Europe and Africa.

Bill

Bill, kind of curious what the difference is between major editing and some rewriting? I'm not trying to argue semantics but wondered what the difference was in the publishing world? Thanks.

It's always interesting to hear stories like this one.

Yukon Delta:

The terms mean different things to different people, but here are my definitions:

"Major editing" involves correcting spelling, grammar, syntax and punctuation in virtually every paragraph as well as checking and correcting some facts and fixing a few things that would leave a reader with questions.

"Rewriting" means I look at the mess and try to decide what the guy is trying to say (it's not always easy), then toss it and write it myself.

Mac's formal education ended in the third or fourth grade when he ran away from home to escape an abusive stepfather, and although he educated himself through his travels and by constantly reading (he claimed to have read every word in a set of encycopedias he stored in my office), he was not very literate.

Bill

Thanks Bill.

Bill you did a good job with what you had. When I read the part about Mac yelling at some Asian guy to "go get a job" and things of that nature I said to myself--"I bet that guy was fun to work with."

Somebody could have yelled at Mac to get an education.

quote:

Originally posted by Gayne C. Young:
Bill you did a good job with what you had. When I read the part about Mac yelling at some Asian guy to "go get a job" and things of that nature I said to myself--"I bet that guy was fun to work with."

I bought McElroy Hunts Asia, or some such title, and reading Mac's inflated sense of self-importance (like described above), is the reason I haven't bought anymore of his books. His berating of all around him and his unwillingness to accept any of the responsibility when things went wrong drove me crazy. Guess its easier to be a "big man" and blame those around you when you screw up, rather than accept any of the responsibility.

Rashid Jamsheed's book has a similar taint for the same reason.

quote:

Originally posted by yukon delta:
Somebody could have yelled at Mac to get an education.

He had small man disease it wouldn't have helped.

Elgin Gates was the same.

The one instance I remember of Gates being critical of the outfitter/guides was in Mongolia. I always wondered about that until I read Basil Bradbury's account of the same hunt. According to Basil, Elgin wasn't nearly as onerous as he should have been. Klein also backed up the story.

I think the fact that Elgin was complementary to Jack Blacklaws, especially when things went squirrely in Africa, and his vesting praise on others while hunting across the globe, puts Elgin in a different class than CJ. What I've read of CJ has been that, when things go right it was because CJ was such a magnificent hunter, when things went wrong, it was everyone else's fault.

Jamsheed shared like views.

I never met Elgin Gates, but I have read his books about his supposed feats and closely studied his trophy photos. The kindest thing I can say is that some of what he wrote was grossly overwritten, aggrandized prose. As for his photos, they were published before Photoshop and it is not difficult to spot the fraud.

I did know Mac. I even hunted with him in Spain and Zambia. As I've said often, he wanted to be remembered as the world's greatest hunter and could not believe that his founding of SCI would be remembered long after his hunting feats were forgotten. I personally never heard Mac pass the blame to anyone else when it was his fault that something went wrong. He pointed his key people in the direction he wanted and backed away and let us do our jobs without interfering.

It is no secret that he was intensely disliked by the Bradbury/Gates/Klein clique. I suspect it was because they viewed him as an uppity, uneducated Indian (his mother was Cherokee and his formal education ended in grammar school) socially unworthy of their good ol' boys' club.

Bill Quimby

The safari that Gates and Roy Rogers took to Mozambique that Gates claimed to have taken severl world records, was probably what sealed his fate in my mind.

I have read both the acount in True and Boddington's theory on what actually happened on that hunt.

In my opinion it looks as though Gates had manufactured the size of several of his trophies there.

Roy Rogers must have been a hell of a gentlemen not to bunk that safari.

I spent two or three hours with Roy Rogers at the One Shot Antelope Hunt in Wyoming many years ago. He indeed was a gentleman, and although he mentioned taking an elephant he did not brag about it. Until just now I was unaware that Gates was with him.

Bill Quimby

"When I read the part about Mac yelling at some Asian guy to "go get a job" and things of that nature I said to myself--"I bet that guy was fun to work with.""

Gayne:

I skimmed the book looking for this reference but couldn't find it. I did find an instance where he told a young American drug addict in Afghanistan to go home. Was this what you meant?

Bill Quimby

Yep same hunt. The book is with my stuff in shipment so I can't tell you the dates. I figure Roy was about 50?

You hunted the one shot? Dad was a guide for several years, he was the under-sheriff of Fremont county under Tim McKinney in the 1970s and 1980s.

He guided a lot of hunting industry people and pro atheletes and a Buck Knife President.

Wonderful organization the one shot.

They do something similar with sage grouse, I think it's called the 3 shot.

If I ever end up "Painted back home in Wyoming" (and I sure wouldn't mind it), the one shot is something I want to be involved in. Though I am not sure I want to live in Riverton again.

"You hunted the one shot? Dad was a guide for several years, he was the under-sheriff of Fremont county under Tim McKinney in the 1970s and 1980."

If his nickname was "Pee Wee," he guided me and Gov. Ed Hirschler on the 1983 hunt. Craig Boddington, Dave Petzel and I made up the Outdoor Writers Team that year. We won with three one-shot kills in a record aggregate team time of twenty-seven minutes. I later served a term as president of the Past Shooters Club. During my term we funded an expansion of what later became the Lander Community Center.

Haven't heard about the sage grouse hunt, but I do know of several copy-cat events including a two-shot goose hunt and a one-shot impala hunt in South Africa. Several friends and I used to host one we called "The Arizona Pig and Quail Hunt" until our game commission put archery javelina tags on a permit-only basis.

Wyoming is a wonderful state, and my wife and I might consider spending our summers up there if we didn't have a cabin in Arizona's high country.

Bill Quimby

Pee Wee? Nope, not him. I'll ask him if he remembers that guy. His name is Tom Dyer.

quote:

Originally posted by billrquimby:
I personally never heard Mac pass the blame to anyone else when it was his fault that something went wrong. Bill Quimby

So he actually never made a bad stalk or spooked an animal, or never pulled the trigger on the wrong animal? Gosh, he was the greatest that ever lived, then. In the Asia book, he berated the different guides and porters and everyone else for blown stalks, him shooting the wrong animal, etc... He didn't own up to the fact that he did it, it was someone else's fault. Not his responsibility, I guess.

I never met Mac, nor Klein or Gates. I would have liked to meet Herb and Elgin, but can't say I'd walk across the road to meet Mac, based on what I've read.

If Mac was different than my impression, maybe what he had put in text should not have be written.

"In the Asia book, he berated the different guides and porters and everyone else for blown stalks, him shooting the wrong animal, etc... He didn't own up to the fact that he did it, it was someone else's fault. Not his responsibility, I guess. .... If Mac was different than my impression, maybe what he had put in text should not have be written."
"

DPhillips:

I will have to read it again. It was so long ago when I edited it -- and I was new to editing -- that I can't remember what would contaminate your impression of the guy. He was controversial to be sure, and he had a huge ego when it came to his hunting, but I never saw him blame others for his problems.

Bill Quimby

"Yesterday's hero, today's villain." Easy to lambast someone once dead, but I wonder what those who are so critical of Mac ever accomplished. His life is a success story and he made one of the, if not the, greatest contribution to the hunting world by founding SCI. We all have our "warts" and I am sure his critics are no exception. May he rest in peace.....

So what do we call him a bastard? But a good one!

quote:

Originally posted by D99:
So what do we call him a bastard? But a good one!

No need to call him anything but a good man who did a fine job, hunted well and hard, and made a contribution that benefited all of us.