A Strange Hunt

Son Shannon started off this hunting season by getting a fat whitetail buck opening day and I asked him why he did that. He answered, “Dad! I just wasn’t thinking,” and he rationalized that he can still hunt elk. As for me, I don’t hunt much anymore. Remember far more days afield than most.

Like 42 years ago. Was having coffee with Erick Lund and he asked if I’d be interested in doing a story for Saturday Evening Post about the chain store founder, H.R. Gibson. I said sure so Erick sent samples of my writing to the magazine’s New York office and I got the assignment. The editor sent me to Durango, Colo., to hunt with Mr. Gibson in the San Juan National Forest.

Mr. Gibson was a big man and drove big cars. Picked me up at Durango in an Cadillac Eldorado and we zoomed into the mountains on a narrow dirt road. Mr. Gibson often spoke while waving both hands in the air. Thought I was going to die ... but reached his camp alive. He owned 180 acres inside a designated wilderness area and somehow got a Forest Service special permit for a powerline.

This was so mighty hunters could have electric blankets, the maids could put clean sheets on the beds each day and wash clothes. Cooks had electric lights, refrigerators, the works. All housed in a canvas city where the tents had wooden walls. Other hunters there were Gibson employees along with CEOs of corporations such as Coleman Manufacturing.

I hunted with several people and one named Jim had a Ford Bronco with huge tires and stereo. It seemed weird to be hunting from a vehicle which nonchalantly climbed over logs and boulders to Charlie Pride singing “When the New Wears Off of Your Crystal Chandeliers.” Camp score for the first three days was 10 elk, nine deer and two bobcats. I only had a deer license and wanted a trophy rack, which I never saw.

Mrs. Gibson was a small town woman who carried a big rifle and hunted in Africa. One morning she went with Mr. Gibson, two others and me by horse. After ascending a couple of miles above camp, our guide said this was where Mrs. Gibson would stand under a pine tree. When she was comfortably settled, the rest continued on up the ridge. It was fairly open country and I looked back to her stand as the sun rose. She was dazzling, blazed like the northern lights and Mr. Gibson explained his wife was wearing some of her diamonds.

My most memorable trophy from that hunt is hanging next to the den door. It is a finely embroidered patch for the Colorado Game, Fish and Parks. The centerpiece is a facing big horn ram. A kindly game warden took that off his jacket and gave it to me after I showed him my license and explained what I was doing there. He probably felt sorry for me having to hunt from a camp with only three speeds on the electric blankets.

Right after this Colorado hunt, I talked to the Post’s editor again and told him I had to see the retail operations and he agreed. Flew to Dallas and my brother Ritchey went along “just for fun.” Mr. Gibson picked us up at the airport and he started waving his arms around again talking to Ritchey and I conned him into letting me drive. At his latest store we were taken through “the first retail in America covering over 100,000 square feet on one floor.”

Back home, I worked hard on the story and finished it by staying up all one night for the final touches. Was sitting at my desk that morning when the newspaper thumped on our porch. Wandered out bleary eyed and saw a shocking front page headline, “Saturday Evening Post calls it quits.”

Read how the famous magazine started by Benjamin Franklin was through. Made coffee then called New York. Caught my editor and he opened the conversation, “I know why you are calling. Don’t worry, just send in the story.”

My deal was to get $500 up front, all expenses. $500 when I sent in the story, and another $500 upon publication. I didn’t get that last $500, but I did get adventure, that patch and a picture of Mrs. Gibson wearing diamonds ... in an elk blind.