THE SMILE OF A HAPPY GUN
PHEASANT TO ORDER
On a private game preserve surrounding their country home near Pine Plains, N.Y., Mr. and Mrs. Elwood Whitney, who live in a New York City apartment, entertain guests with a weekend of released pheasant shooting. A few hours before the hunt, pen-raised ringnecks were released to join the wild pheasants roaming the 900 acres of this custom-made hunting preserve. Result: some of the finest wing shooting of its kind in the East
HUNTERS SWING HURRIEDLY TO COVER RISING PHEASANT IN FIELD OF SUMAC. WHITNEY (FOREGROUND) AND GUEST MRS. NORA DARDEN (RIGHT) BACK MRS. WHITNEY'S SHOT, WHICH PROVED SUCCESSFUL
Welcome rest in the field before lunch is taken by hunters, who tramped across hilly hunting country all morning. Host Whitney, an advertising man, lights up a cigaret while Dick Gelb of New York, Meurice Wolverton of Pittsfield, Mass. and Mrs. Whitney relax.
Good retrieve is enthusiastically made by one of the dogs used during the two-day hunt after Wolverton, a Chevrolet dealer, had downed his first bird. For most of the hunt Whitney's own outsize but willing Weimaraner, Mr. Big, did the bird dog work.
NORA DARDEN OF PHILADELPHIA SMILES HAPPILY AFTER A SUCCESSFUL SHOT
ALONG A SEEMINGLY ENDLESS TRAIL IN NORTH DAKOTA, GORDON WESTLIE (LEFT) OF MINOT AND SAMUEL BURGESS OF DICKINSON SEARCH FOR PHEASANTS AS LATE AFTERNOON SETTLES UPON THEM
Vivacious hostess Frances Leach accents dinner coffee with western humor.
Oil man-cattle rancher Tom Leach of Tulsa and Bismarck consults guest Al Weinhandl (right) on progress of pheasant dinner in elaborate kitchen of Lea Kel Ranch.
WILD HARVEST IN NORTH DAKOTA
In the state where a man can see three days ahead and the rolling fields seem filled with pheasants, Dakotans are reaping a rich crop of game. At the 10,000-acre Lea Kel Ranch in Towner western hospitality glowed warm as ice-garbed winds whipped across the prairies and made the fat, wary birds even wilder. Undaunted by the climate, hunters sought and found their prey in the cornfields, in the coulees and along an endless maze of crisscrossed hay trails
Bulging limit of 24 cock pheasant plus bonus of Hungarian partridges and grouse is displayed at end of day. Happy hunters are (left to right): Dr. Ward Robinson, Minot; Al Weinhandl, president of Minot's First National Bank; Gordon Westlie of Westlie Motors, Minot; Lawton (Buzz Osborn Jr., Dickinson photographer; Ed Tobin, Dickinson utility executive; Sam Burgess, publisher-owner of The Dickinson Press; John Peters of Lefor, cattle rancher; and John Schneider, postal official of Lefor.
PACK TRIP TO BIGGER GAME
Out of Cody, Wyo., 13 hardy hunters wended their way by horseback toward the rugged hills of the Thorofare Wilderness. They came from all over—a banker from Florida, a mechanic from Wyoming, a supermarket owner from Ohio. They had little in common save a love of hunting, but the promise of elk, moose and mountain sheep brought them together for 10 days with Speed Spiegelberg's commercial pack trip (at $500 each)
Trophy Elk was shot by Otto Kreb, a butcher from Euclid, Ohio (left), who was guided by Jim Egeland (right), a cat-skinner from Cody.
Long cold wait for elk goes unrewarded for Bruce Jarvis of Ashtabula, Ohio, who reflects the silent thoughts of a tired, frustrated hunter.
AFTER FOUR DAYS, SEARCH AND SUSPENSE, GLADE NELSON OF OREGON BASIN, WYO. (LEFT) AND GUIDE JIM EGELAND SPOT A MOOSE IN THE TALL GRASS. SECONDS LATER NELSON FELLED IT—HIS FIRST
Changeable weather found hunters cold one minute, hot the next. Above, Floridians Dr. Charles Grace and Hobson Cone relax in sun.
Best trophy of hunt was bighorn sheep with full curl, shot in rough terrain by Norman Samuelson of Cody, here being congratulated by Speed.
FIVE PHOTOS
ROBERT HALMI
FOUR PHOTOS
ED STEIN
FIVE PHOTOS
JOERN GERDTS