BRINGING THE OUTSIDE IN – AND IT’S A BIG, BIG OUTDOOR WORLD! – LURES, GUNS, ART, AND SO MUCH MORE
Sporting Collectibles by Jim and Vivian Karsnitz. With information on antiques, decoys, hand loading tools, shot shells, shell boxes, target balls, licenses, traps, books, paper arts, prints, advertisements, glassware, stamps, and much more.
Decoys and Calling Are A Deadly Gobbler Combination
Spring 2017
Springtime is turkey time in my hunter’s world. Snow season slowly yields to mud season in the heart of the Rockies, and milder nights and that sweet, sweet green-up simply cannot come fast enough.
No doubt that the turkeys are quite happy about their prospects too. It is the time of yelping hens and owl hoots and gobbles from the roost. It’s the time of the hunter’s moon, and of hurried walks to one’s favorite ridge or field well before fly down.
Anticipation hangs thick in the air, for turkeys, and hunters too. They must fulfill their need to breed, and we, in turn, must hunt. And, I say, is there anything more thrilling than spying a wary old bird slinking towards the decoy, suddenly halting to lay its head back and roar as that big, magnificent fan jumps to life?
Such are the joys of turkey hunting, and the mere possibility of those memorable moments are calling us out, just over here, and there. It is a serious outdoor addiction waiting to be born. Once acquired, it must be respected, nurtured, and satisfied. Sometimes, you may even kill a turkey.
I did just that, late last week, as did a great friend and hunting partner (and master caller too!). As you can see, pictured below are two fine examples of Colorado’s turkey hunting opportunities. The hunting can be grand, though almost always challenging.
Colorado offers a vast catalog of public hunting lands, and the turkey population is expanding every year. That’s some very great news for the turkey hunter.
With that being said, one of the downsides of hunting in Colorado is that much of the turkey hunting areas are easily accessible, and hunting pressure is increasing exponentially. Frustration can run high, and success can be a rare and elusive target.
But it can be done.
Both of these birds were taken on some of the heaviest hunted public lands in northwestern Colorado, and they both came to a call. We left a few in the woods too!
So, get out there and burn up some boot leather. See what’s over the hill and down in the draw, and listen for that unmistakable springtime exaltation!
The birds are there, ready for action, and a thrill. I wouldn’t miss it for the world…
Spring Turkey Hunting is a Blast! Photo by Rocky Tschappat
Climb to The Snow Line – It’s What the Merriam’s Do! Photo by Rocky Tschappat
And by the way, did I mention that wild turkey can be most excellent table fare.
SPRING TURKEY HUNTER’S BRUNCH
1 turkey breast, cut into strips, or cubed into small pieces
yellow mustard
italian dressing
garlic powder
cracked black pepper
1 pound mushrooms
1 package fresh spinach
small package of goat chevre (or other cheese)
sourdough english muffins
unsalted butter
Mix and cover turkey meat with mustard, garlic powder, and italian dressing. Refrigerate for 24 hours.
Saute mushrooms and spinach in butter. Fry or grill turkey meat until just cooked through, about 170 degrees. Spread Chevre on toasted sourdough muffins, and top with meat, mushrooms, and spinach.
Serve with chilled Champagne, or a Mimosa on ice.
Enjoy!
– Marinade Recipe provided by Rocky Tschappat, who was given it by a grizzled old turkey hunter whom we would all no doubt like to meet…
Outdoorsman’s Edge Guide To Advanced Turkey Hunting. By Richard Combs. Published by Woods N’ Water, Inc., 2001, 165 pages. With chapters on scouting, setup, advanced calling strategies, blinds, recovering turkeys, the optimum turkey gun, fall turkey hunting, and much more. Photos throughout.
In Fine condition, and Near Fine dustjacket.
$12.95 plus $4 shipping (US). Subject to prior sale. Paypal and checks accepted.
by Jewett, John Howard
First edition. Hard cover. Dodge Publishing Company (1909)
Very good. No dust jacket. Signed by previous owner. With gilt decorations on front cover and spine. Bound in red cloth, with some light wear at edges. Internal crack. Quite scarce in any condition, particularly in First Edition
I often wonder where I would be were it not for a man called Jim Kjelgaard.
More than likely I would not have become nearly half the man I am, or strive to be, had we not been introduced. Nor would I have lived the life of a hunter, biologist, an outdoor writer, or an ever hopeful wildlife photographer.
I probably would not have left my home in the New Jersey Pine Barrens for the wide open views of the Rocky Mountains, either.
Chances are you may not know him by name, though his reach and influence continues to this day. His work captivated a generation of young boys, soon to be men, searching for the soul of adventure and the heart of the wild outdoors.
Wikipedia defines Mr. Kjelgaard as an American Author of Young Adult Literature, which in my way of thinking is like saying that an ocean of water is very wet. As an author of forty novels and countless short stories and other works, he was certainly that, and more. Much, much more. He meant everything to a young boy bursting to learn what lived beyond the outer limits of his own backyard.
I have always been a reader, blessedly so, and born for it I suppose. I took to books like black ink yearns for the creative freedom of an empty white page. My face became well-known in any library I could enter, until I had read almost everything on animals and fishing and all things outdoors from their limited selections.
And then an angel of a librarian handed me a copy of “Stormy”, a story about an outlaw Labrador Retriever and his owner, written by this fellow with the strange name. It was unlike anything I had ever read and I was hooked deep in my insides like a catfish on a cane pole.
I was to discover very soon that dogs were a prominent feature in a Kjelgaard story. It’s easy to see why, since there is something completely natural and magical about young boys and their dogs. The combination just begs for adventure and open space to run and roam. They encourage each other on and on, over the hill to the next discovery, past the bend in the ever beckoning road. Together, there is nothing a boy and a dog can’t do.
I have read a little about the author’s life and I am convinced that he understood and loved the outdoors with a passion that even he could not convey. You can feel it on every page and in every character of every sentence. He had a remarkable ability to put you in the moment, in and of the scene, as if it were written just for you. He tells you that you can experience it too, if you chose.
Don’t wait, he says, just get out there and listen to the music of the hounds between deep breaths of pine and sugar maple under the brilliance of a harvest moon. His books hold the waving fields of marsh grass and the woods full of white-tailed deer and bobwhite quail and the screams of brightly colored blue jays. He shows us boys with guns, back when it was a natural and good thing that made you smile, knowing that some lucky family was sure to be enjoying a meal of squirrel or cottontail rabbit very soon.
Open to any page, and you can hear the sounds in your head as if you were standing there yourself. It was a guaranteed transport to a technicolored world of motion and light with a dog by your side. A world defined by the movements of animals and the rhythm of the seasons, punctuated by the sounds of drumming grouse and the chorus of frogs in the evening.
The comforts of family and home life ran strong throughout his stories. It was what made it all work.It was the knowing that safety and the comforting hearth of home stood solidly back where you had come from, when you needed it, which give us all the strength to be brave and venture out and abroad.
Sadly, Jim has been gone for some time now, just like the world he once knew. He was taken from us much too soon, by illness and despair, and though that world he inhabited may be gone his voice is as relevant today as it was back then. In fact it is even more important than it ever was. He is a beacon of light for the spirits of young boys and their four-legged companions, filled with the quest for exploration and the simple, unmitigated joy of being a boy.
Of course I never met him personally, though I wish I had. Sadly, he was already gone when I was barely born. I would give much of what I have just to thank him for all of his precious gifts to me. It is because of Jim Kjelgaard and men like him that I have wandered the wilderness and spirited air, and lived a life filled with my own stories to tell.
Turning to face the world, what more can a young boy hope for?
To hear an excellent audio reading of this post, listen at ADVENTURECAST.
Jim Kjelgaard books are prized by collectors. First Edition copies with dustjackets in collectible condition are extremely difficult to find. They can be expensive, too!
A Man’s Best Friend! From The Book Collection of Michael Patrick McCarty
This amazing inscription reads: “All best wishes to the best darn teacher – librarian, and best friend in the world. Jim Kjelgaard”.
Something tells me that this teacher was very proud of the student!
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*Many of Jim Kjelgaard’s books are still in print across the globe, and he is a pre-eminent favorite among those who wish to home school. So, if you somehow missed him, it’s not too late. You may also want to track down a copy of the 1962 Walt Disney film “Big Red”, named after that marvelous and unforgettable Irish Setter of the same name. It will make you want to run out and acquire an Irish Setter too!
“Born in the wilderness, the puppy had to learn the ways of survival like any other wild thing. Staghound and Husky ancestors had given him speed and stamina, but it was his own courage and intelligence that brought him through when a weaker dog would have perished. He learned to hunt, to find shelter, to protect himself from enemies”.
The Dustjacket From a First Edition Copy of Sow Dog by Jim Kjelgaard. Illustrated by Jacob Landau
The Endpapers From a First Edition Copy of Sow Dog by Jim Kjelgaard. Illustrated by Jacob Landau
Kalak of the Ice – 1949, Holiday House
A Nose for Trouble – 1949, Holiday House
Wild Trek – 1950, Holiday House
“Wild trek is an adventure story involving Chiri, the half-wild hero of snow dog, and his trapper master. Their problem is to find and rescue a naturalist whose plane has been forced down in the Caribou Mountains, deep in the Canadian wilderness”.
It’s all About The TrekIllustrated Endpapers by H. K. Faye From A First Edition Copy of Wild Trek By Jim KjelgaardA Very Special Double Dedication
Chip the Dam Builder – 1950, Holiday House
Irish Red, Son of Big Red -1951, Holiday House – 1962, Collins Famous Dog Stories
Fire-hunter – 1951, Holiday House
Saber-tooths and Bears and Wolves Oh Boy!
“This is a story of the days when sabertooth tigers and wooly mammoths roamed the earth. When men lived in wandering bands and stalked their prey with spears and clubs. When fire was their greatest friend, and human hands and brains their only advantage over wild beasts”.
The Explorations of Pere Marquette -1951, Random House
Trailing Trouble – 1952, Holiday House
Outlaw Red, Son of Big Red – 1953, Holiday House
The Spell of the White Sturgeon – 1953, Dodd Mead
The Sturgeon Abides!
“The vivid, action-packed story of a boy from the New York waterfront who sought adventure on tempestuous, yet fascinating Lake Michigan when the Midwest was growing hardily and fishing was the chief energetic industry of that great body…and he found too, that the giant white sturgeon who cast a spell of fear over the sturdiest fishermen whenever it appeared, could mean good fortune for him”.
“To The World’s Best Librarian From The World’s Worst Writer Jim”. A Uniquely Personal Inscription
The Coming of the Mormons – 1953, Random House
Haunt Fox– 1954, Holiday House
Cracker Barrel Trouble Shooter– 1954, Dodd Mead
Lion Hound– 1955, Holiday House
Collins Famous Dog Stories
The Lost Wagon – 1955, Dodd Mead
Desert Dog – 1956, Holiday House
Trading Jeff and his Dog– 1956, Dodd Mead
Wildlife Cameraman– 1957, Holiday House
A Book That Inspired a Generation of Wildlife Photographers
Wilderness, a Camera, and the Promise of Adventure
Double Challenge – 1957, Dodd Mead
We Were There at the Oklahoma Land Run – 1957, Grosset & Dunlap
Wolf Brother – 1957, Holiday House – 1963, Collins Famous Dog Stories
Swamp Cat– 1957, Dodd Mead
The Wild Horse Roundup-Collection of Stories by Western Writers of America, Editor – 1957, Dodd Mead
Rescue Dog of the High Pass– 1958, Dodd Mead
Hound Dogs & Others-Collection of Stories by Western Writers of America, Editor – 1958, Dodd Mead
The Land is Bright– 1958, Dodd Mead
The Black Fawn– 1958, Dodd Mead
The Story of Geronimo – 1958, Grosset & Dunlap
Hi Jolly – 1959, Dodd Mead
Stormy – 1959, Holiday House
Ulysses & his Woodland Zoo – 1960, Dodd Mead
Boomerang Hunter– 1960, Holiday House
The Duck-footed Hound– 1960, Crowell
Tigre – 1961, Dodd Mead
The Front of Dustjacket Illustration by Everett Raymond Kinstler, Found On A First Edition Copy of Tigre by Jim Kjelgaard
“Pepe, the youthful Mexican goatherd, had many battles to fight…and hardest of all, against the killer tigre or jaguar which had taken the life of Pepe’s father and threatened to destroy the family herd of goats, their very livelihood”
Hidden Trail– 1962, Holiday House
Fawn in the Forest & other Wild Animal Stories– 1962, Dodd Mead
Two Dogs & a Horse– 1964, Dodd Mead
Furious Moose of the Wilderness– 1965, Dodd Mead
Dave and his Dog, Mulligan– 1966, Dodd Mead
“…his great wish was to become a game warden…Dave had a second big dream for the future. He wanted to prove that hunting the “varmints” – the coyotes, the bobcats and lions that ran rampant in the nearby countryside – could prove a challenging, diverting sport to the countless hunters who swarmed into the area each open season, mostly in quest of deer. This would also put a stop to the reckless placing of poison bait by certain ruthless sheepmen whose flocks were being raided by the varmints”. (From the Dustjacket Flap)
Illustration By Sam Savitt, From a First Edition Copy of Dave and His Dog, Mulligan
Coyote Song – 1969, Dodd Mead
Front Cover of The Dustjacket of A First Edition Copy of Coyote Song By Jim Kjelgaard. Illustrated By Robert Maclean
A Close-up of the spine, with gilt titles, of Fun With Trout
The Front Cover, in maroon cloth with gilt titles and pictorial label. There’s Something Wonderful About Those 1950’s Vintage Colors
“Prospective Golden Fun”. A Color Plate From Fun With Trout
A Full Page Illustration From Fun With Trout
FOR SALE
Presenting Fun with Trout: Trout Fishing in Words, Paint & Lines. By Fred Everett. Preface by Charles K. Fox. Introduction by Ray Bergman.
Published by The Stackpole Co, Harrisburg, PA, 287 pages, 1952.
Maroon cover with gilt lettering and paste down illustration by Everett of a trout fisherman with rod and netted trout. With pictorial end papers, and internal line drawings.
An entertaining, often whimsical discussion on flytying, wetflying, dryflying, and more.
Dedicated “to the spirit of the great out-of-doors, its waters and the life therein, an ever enticing lure from the humdrum of everyday life to the body-reviving and soul-filling pastime of fishing; to the spirit of true sportsmanship and all that it means for fair play, courtesy, cooperation and real conservation; to the very spirit of angling itself, this book is sincerely and humbly dedicated”.
This copy is in Near Fine condition, without Dustjacket.
Here offered at $45, postpaid U.S. (subject to prior sale)
I have always been a reader, blessedly so, and born for it I suppose. I took to books like black ink yearns for the creative freedom of an empty white page. My face became well-known in any library I could enter, until I had read almost everything on animals and fishing and all things outdoors from their limited selections.
And then an angel of a librarian handed me a copy of “Stormy”, a story about an outlaw Labrador Retriever and his owner, written by this fellow with the strange name. It was unlike anything I had ever read and I was hooked deep in my insides like a catfish on a cane pole.
It was big, eye-opening reading for a nine-year old. The world suddenly opened to wild possibilities, and the book is one of the reasons that I went on to earn a Wildlife Biology Degree in College. Jim Kjelgaard helped me to become a hunter too, and not just any kind of hunter, but a waterfowl hunter at that.
I have since come to love biting wind and snow squalls and white-capped waves in an icy marsh. I owe it all to an outlaw dog named Stormy, and a writer that knew him better than the dog himself.
For Sale:
Stormy. By Jim Kjelgaard. Published by Holiday House/Scott, Foresman, 1959. Hardcover, without Dustjacket as issued. In Very Good condition. This is not an X-library copy, as is more commonly offered. Uncommon in this Edition.
“Allan Marley and his father have lived together in the untamed wilderness of the Beaver Flowage all their lives. But when Mr. Marley is jailed because of a bitter feud, Allan suddenly finds himself on his own. Then he meets Stormy, an outlaw dog who has been accused of turning on his owner. Allan knows that the big black retriever has been mistreated, and he works hard to win the noble dog’s trust and affection. As allies, Allan and Stormy overcome every danger they encounter in the unpredictable wilderness…but can their bond protect Allan from the viciousness of his father’s human enemies? ”
Offered for $65 postpaid in U.S. Please contact us to purchase (Subject to prior sale).
Did you know that you may be a deltiologist? Would your next question be, just what in the heck is that?
As it turns out, I may be one too, and I had thought that I just liked many of the images which can be found on old postcards.
Deltiology is the study and collection of postcards, and of course a deltiologist is one who collects. If you do, you are far from being alone. It is the third largest collecting hobby after stamp and coin collecting.
How about that?
I am particularly drawn to images relating to natural history and wildlife, and even more so to vintage hunting and fishing scenes.
My collection is not that big, and I don’t know all that much about the collecting field in itself. My only real motive to this point is that I bought them because I like them. I suspect that some of the images are rare. No doubt, some are not. Most are completely fascinating, at least to me.
I do know that picture postcards fall into categories based on the time period produced and published. The years 1898 to 1919 are considered to be the Golden Age of Postcards, followed by Linen Postcards (1930-1950), and the Modern Chromes (after 1940). There are further differentiations within these categories.
I found this particular postcard in a second-hand store, and I was astounded at the sheer size of the fish. My first reaction was to wonder – were they real?
Well, of course they are, and it is not an optical illusion. Photoshop and other photo manipulation programs had yet to be imagined.
But what about these magnificent fish? Could the largest of them depicted here really have weighed in at 320 pounds?
The postcard simply states “A Catch of Black Sea Bass”, and that would appear to be quite an understatement for fish of this size. It is a species that until this time I was completely unfamiliar with, and that in itself was a big surprise. But then again, I was born and raised on the East Coast, and they are found primarily off of the coast of California, and south into Mexico.
Obviously, they would not be an easy fish to miss, though their true name is the Giant (Black) Sea Bass. To this day very little is know about their biology and habits. They may be capable of reaching lengths of up to seven or eight feet, and one specimen was reported to have weighed nearly 800 pounds. Now that’s a fish that can really get your attention, which sometimes is not such a good thing.
By 1915 both commercial and sport fisherman had taken their toll on the population. By 1935 most commercial fishing was no longer viable, and by the 1970’s they had all but disappeared. Finally, in 1981 the state of California closed all fishing for the Giant Sea Bass, although no official conservation status has ever been designated.
Postcards can be difficult to date. This one was easy, since the postmark tells us that it was posted in 1909. And we know that the charter was by the Office Meteor Boat Company, which was an established company on Catalina Island at the time. One must wonder if the participants ever had an idea that the best sport fishing years were nearly at an end?
No one knows yet if the king of the kelp forest will ever make a full recovery, but from what I can gather there is still hope. Until then, we may have to be content with known historical reports and the photographic record, such as it is.
And that’s another great reason to collect postcards…
Powerful, brutal, beautiful, and at times, enchanting, winter in Yellowstone National Park is a world unlike any other. It is a season both abstract and profound, where super-heated water erupts into arctic air, where wildlife pushes snow in a constant struggle to survive, and where silence and solitude dominate the park’s deep wilderness. Photographer Tom Murphy has experienced Yellowstone’s winter wilderness as few others have, skiing far into the backcountry with heavy camera gear, an uncanny ability to weather cold and snow, and an artist’s eye for the sublime. His photographs reveal a majestic land where the air is clean and clear and where a wolf’s throaty howl carries for miles on a still day.
“Silence & Solitude: Yellowstone’s Winter Wilderness” shows us the splendor and force of Yellowstone’s long cold. In 130 photos we begin to understand the lives of the wildlife that must endure it; we begin to feel the inspiring power of a landscape still wild and pure; and we see nature’s beauty in things great and small. These photos are accompanied by Murphy’s thoughtful words that take us into the time and place of each image. The captions allow us to smile at a fox’s serious hunt for a mouse, to understand why bison stand stoically in geothermal steam, and to marvel at a sudden shift of subtle light that brings breathtaking grandeur to a nondescript little tree and just as suddenly takes it away.
As popular author Tim Cahill observes in his foreword, “These are photos that mirror a man’s passion, and I know of nothing like them anywhere. Murphy’s photographs are not simply stunning or striking: they are also knowledgeable and even wise.”
“Russell Chatham (born October 27, 1939) is a contemporary American landscape artist who spent most of his career living in Livingston, Montana. The artist is the grandson of landscape painter Gottardo Piazzoni,though he is essentially a self-taught artist. His work has been exhibited in over 400 one man shows and in museums and galleries over the last five decades. Notable art critic Robert Hughes is numbered one of Chatham’s collectors and there are others as diverse as Paul Allen and actor Jack Nicholson. Chatham’s work eschews the narrative tendency of much western art and presents landscapes that stand in intimate relationship towards the human figure even in the absence of it. In the early 1980s Chatham began making lithographs and now stands as one of the world’s foremost practitioners of that craft.
In addition to Lithography, Chatham also produces original oil paintings. His oil paintings currently sell for tens of thousands of dollars, and there is a multi-year waiting list for commissions, but according to his dealers, he prefers printing lithographs as the more challenging art form. (Longtime Livingston residents can recall a time when early in his career Chatham traded his canvases for essential services in a barter arrangement.) Despite being a print, Chatham’s lithographs have little to do with modern process lithography, which always starts from a photograph and typically only uses 4 colors. His art lithographs may have 30 or 40 different layers of color, all of which have to be hand drawn on to the printing plate, and the colors selected for the final effect. To see some of the early proofs of one of his prints is to see a study in vivid and unusual colors from which it is almost impossible to conceive of the final subtle shadings and quiet colors.
In addition to his work as a painter, Chatham has also published a series of short stories “Dark Waters” in which he details the exploits of his hunting friends, like the author Jim Harrison. ..
Many of Chatham’s painted works have adorned the covers of Harrison’s works.” – Wikipedia
Below are some selected offerings from Michael Patrick McCarty, Bookseller:
The Angler’s Coast by Russell Chatham. Hard cover. Clark City Press, Livingston, Montana. First Clark City Press Printing ,1990, 163 pages. Very good in very good dust jacket. A light bump to upper corners, and a slight dent to lower cover edge. Else in Very Good+ condition with like dustjacket, which has some light edgewear. Signed “Russell Chatham 1991” on half title page. Autographed copies of this title rarely offered.
$195 plus $4 shipping (in U.S.).
“Everything in nature is essentially inscrutable,” claims Russell Chatham in The Angler’s Coast, but his written observations of the world around him are as evocative as his painted landscapes. First published in 1976, this new edition has been expanded to include photographs of the great fishermen and rivers of the West Coast.” -Publisher’s Synopsis
Silent Seasons: Twenty-One Fishing Stories by Thomas McGuane, William Hjortsberg, Jack Curtis, Harmon Henkin, Charles Waterman, Jim Harrison & Russell Chatham. Clark City Press, Livingston, Montana. Stated First Printing, 1988, 205 pages. Softcover, in Fine Condition with Fine Dustjacket. Signed “Russell Chatham, 1990” on half-title page; scarce thus.
$95 plus $4 shipping (in U.S.).
“This is probably the best assembly of fine writers who happen to be fisherman that you’ll find; you don’t even have to be a fisherman to enjoy it. You won’t learn much about how to fish but I promise that you’ll discover many of the reasons that sensient, articulate and thoughtful people want fishing to be part of the fabric of their lives.” – Gene Hill
Dark Waters: Essays, Stories and Articles by Russell Chatham. Clark City Press, Livingston, Montana. Stated First Printing, 1988, 205 pages. Softcover, in Fine Condition with Fine Dustjacket. Signed “Russell Chatham, 1990” on half-title page; scarce thus.
$95 plus $4 shipping (in U.S.). [SOLD]
“In Dark Waters you will find no bilge, no pap, little that you’d expect, feasts you’ll never forget, sights and smells that only an artist’s antennae could catch…this book is bold, outrageous, wise, independent, wrong-headed, delicious, pugnacious, and lots of fun.” – Nick Lyons
In The Analysis of the Hunting Field, Surtees offers wry, fatherly advice in this satiric romp through the key archetypes of the fox hunt. As Lord Denham says in his introduction, “this should be required reading for anyone connected with hunting.
Sporting Lore Galore, With Gilt Decorations and Hand Colored Plates
The Analysis of The Hunting Field; Being A Series of Sketches of the Principle Characters That Compose One. The Whole Forming a Slight Souvenir of The Season, 1845-1846
By Robert Smith Surtees. Illustrated by Henry Thomas Alken.
Published by Rudolf Ackermann; Cook and Co., Printer and Engravers, London (1846).
First Edition, Second Issue.
In Good condition. No dust jacket as issued. Some wear and short tears to cloth at end of spines, and a light and short split to cloth at backstrap. Top edge darkened, with some browning to pages and some occasional light foxing. With titles and preface dated 1846.
There are 6 hand colored plates (including frontispiece), and a hand colored title page. Plates 2, 3, and 4 are dated Nov. 19th. In original maroon cloth, with gilt front and spine decorations.The First Printing is quite scarce in any condition.
Her Offered at $350 postpaid in U.S. (Subject to Prior Sale)
The Plates:1. Frontispiece – The Meet.2. Engraved title.3. Getting Away.4. Full Cry.5. The Check.6. The Leap.7.
Robert Smith Surtees (1805-1864) was an English editor, novelist and sporting writer. Thackeray envied him his powers of observation, while William Morris considered him ‘a master of life’ and ranked him with Dickens. In The Analysis of the Hunting Field, Surtees offers wry, fatherly advice in this satiric romp through the key archetypes of the fox hunt. As Lord Denham says in his introduction, “this should be required reading for anyone connected with hunting. From the right sort of Master to the wrong sort, from the hunting nobleman to the whip and from the blacksmith to the braggart with horses to sell we find the people ‘pon the ‘orses are much the same as today.”
Alken worked in both oil and watercolor and was a skilled etcher. His earliest productions were published anonymously under the signature of “Ben Tallyho”, but in 1816 he issued The Beauties & Defects in the Figure of the Horse comparatively delineated under his own name. From this date until about 1831, he produced many sets of etchings of sporting subjects mostly coloured and sometimes humorous in character, the principal of which were: Humorous Specimens of Riding 1821, Symptoms of being amazed 1822, Symptoms of being amused 1822, Flowers from Nature 1823, A Touch at the Fine Arts 1824, and Ideas 1830. Besides these he published a series of books: Illustrations for Landscape Scenery and Scraps from the Sketch Book of Henry Alken in 1823, New Sketch Book in 1824, Sporting Scrap Book and Shakespeare’s Seven Ages in 1827, Sporting Sketches and in 1831 Illustrations to Popular Songs and Illustrations of Don Quixote, the latter engraved by John Christian Zeitter.
Alken provided the plates picturing hunting, coaching, racing and steeplechasing for The National Sports of Great Britain (London, 1821). Alken, known as an avid sportsman,is best remembered for his hunting prints, many of which he engraved himself until the late 1830s. (Charles Lane British Racing Prints pp. 75–76). He created prints for the leading sporting printsellers such as S. and J. Fuller, Thomas McLean, and Rudolph Ackermann, and often collaborated with his friend the sporting journalist Charles James Apperley (1779–1843), also known as Nimrod.[9] Nimrod’s Life of a Sportsman, with 32 etchings by Alken, was published by Ackermann in 1842. In many of his etchings, Alken explored the comic side of riding and satirized the foibles of aristocrats, much in the tradition of other early 19th century caricaturists such as Thomas Rowlandson and James Gillray. One of his best known paintings, “The Belvoir Hunt: Jumping Into And Out Of A Lane”, hangs in the Tate Britain and shows one of the oldest of the great foxhound packs in Leicestershire. A collection of his illustrations can be seen in the print department of the British Museum. – From wikipedia
With 43 wood engraved text illustrations by Cook and Company.
Brook Trout Put A Smile On Your Face. Photo Courtesy of Rocky Tschappat, Aspen, Colorado
Few things go as well together than brook trout and a clear mountain stream, unless of course it is a hot cast iron pan and some freshly caught fillets.
I am told that these beauties had perfect, firm flesh and that beautiful orange color of wild fish. Apparently, these brookies never saw any wrapping paper either.
Makes my mouth water just thinking about it.
Thank God For Summer!
RECIPE FOR COLORADO COWBOY TROUT
8 small trout
3 apples, sliced thinly
1 sliced onion
honey
3 slices of precooked ham, chopped
cinnamon
salt
pepper
lemon
Stuff trout bodies with apple, onion, and ham. Drizzle some honey on stuffing; add lemon juice and season to taste. Seal in doubled-up heavy-duty foil and cover in hot campfire coals. Bake for about 30 minutes. Serves four.
Keep in mind that if you are making this recipe, you are definitely doing it in the right place and are probably in a fine state of mind.
Enjoy!
*Adapted from The All Trout Cookbook by Rick Taylor. It is a great trout cooking recipe book, and I highly recommend it if you can find a copy.
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It’s Definitely Worth the Walk
Flyfishing the High Country by John Gierach. With Chapters on the high lakes, beaver ponds, the high streams, tackle and flies, the Frying Pan River, and more.
We generally have copies of this in stock, as well as other John Gierach books. Please email for availability and price.
