Deer season opens here tomorrow morning. Deer are plentiful......too plentiful in some areas......and the experts are predicting a record harvest. However it was not always the case.
In the early 1800s all sorts of big game was plentiful in Missouri. Deer, Elk, Black bear, Turkey, even Buffalo and a few Grizzles were around in large number.Nearly a hundred years of unchecked unregulated market hunting along with massive losses of habitat as forests were cleared for farming nearly wiped them all out. By the early 1900s Elk, Buffalo, and Grizzles were gone forever....and the deer and turkey were all but gone. A couple of generations of folks were raised without ever seeing a wild deer or turkey. My dad tells me that when he was a boy in the 1930s the sight of a deer track in the mud was a cause of much excitement. Also in the 1930s the Mo. Conservation Department was established to assist in the effort to save and increase the population of the wildlife that was not already gone. Deer and Turkey were trapped deep in the Ozarks were small populations still existed and relocated to other parts of the state from where they had disappeared. The population slowly gained over the years until by the 1940s it was determined that the deer herd had recovered enough to support a limited hunt in a few select County's. This is known as the States first modern deer hunting season and my grandfather was one of the few who participated in it.......
In the 1940s rural Missouri had still not recovered from the great depression and times were hard....very hard. Many young men enlisted in the military to fight the great war.....many others moved to big city's to work in factory's that supported the war effort. My grandfather tried to enlist but was rejected due to his age and being nearly blind in one eye. Being a woodsman and a farmer he would not - could not -move to a city and work in a factory so he struggled along doing the best he could raising a large family and keeping food on the table during very tough times.He raised most of his own food and worked in the woods hewing railroad ties by hand to make a very few dollars every week. Folks who hewed railroad ties were known as "tie hackers". It was brutal hard physical dangerous work - felling a tree with a axe or saw -then trimming the limbs from it - measuring and sawing it to size-then hewing a square railroad tie from a round log using only a broad axe. It is amazing to me how well they could do this - for sure a lost art. The ties were sold to the railroad for a very small amount of money....a hard weeks work might make you $10.00 or so.....but he was glad to get it and did not expect.....and would have rejected....any offer of government help.....he would have been insulted at the mention of such a thing. (I could make a political comment here but I will resist and get back to the story)
Anyway when he heard of the planned deer season he decided to go....he was in the woods every day and knew where the deer crossed the hollow.....and he figured his family could use the meat. As far as firearms during this first season....there were no laws on what you could use....anything went. Ammunition was very scarce and deer were hunted with everything from .22s to shotguns to civil war era mussel loaders. My grandfather was very lucky in this regard....he had traded for a 1890s era surplus military rifle complete with 3 1890s era bullets. He fired one bullet to see how straight the gun fired and saved 2 for the hunt........he figured he would only need one.
When opening day rolled around Grandpa took his rifle along with his tools and headed out at first light...just as he did every morning except Sunday....(Gods day) He planned to hunt a couple hours in the morning - work through the middle of the day - and hunt a couple more hours in the evening.
As the story was told to me by my father and grandfather almost before he got settled in the woods a HUGE 10 point buck stepped out in the open broadside at close range. Taking careful aim, grandpa squeezes the trigger..........only to have the 50 year old cartridge misfire! At the snap of the misfired cartridge the buck hopped across the ridge and disappeared into the hollow. Grandpas heart sank but he did the only thing he knew to do.....reloaded with his last cartridge and eased down the hollow in the direction the deer had taken.
As he stepped off the ridge -he got lucky- the first thing he saw was the buck standing at the bottom of the hollow looking right at him. Again taking a good aim and squeezing the trigger....this time the gun fired and the monster buck went down!
I would have loved to have seen his reaction at this time but to shorten a long story he field dressed the buck and struggled to drag it up the hill where he hung it from a tree near where he was working and went back to hewing ties.
Word spread about the huge buck that had been taken and before long cars and trucks began appearing down the old logging trail to admire it and congratulate my grandfather. Along toward the middle of the day a new car with a wealthy hunter from St Louis stopped by to look it over.....and offer to buy it.Grandpa laughed at him. Than he offered $100.00 cash.............How could he turn that kind of money down? As much as he disliked the idea he felt he would be letting his family down more by refusing the offer than by accepting probably the most cash money he had seen at one time in his life. He accepted.......grudgingly.
If you check the records of Missouri's first modern deer season.....not many deer were taken. One of the biggest was taken by my grandfather although he will never receive credit for it. 70 years later the story of my grandfathers $100.00 buck is still being told -now to his great great grandchildren. I have his old broad-axe and I sometimes get it out and heft it and remember the proud man who once used it to make a living for his family in rough times. Every time I remember the hunting story I realize how it must have hurt him to sell that deer.....then I realize it was sold not for the love of money....but for the love of his family.
Thanks to all for taking the time to read this old family story.
In the early 1800s all sorts of big game was plentiful in Missouri. Deer, Elk, Black bear, Turkey, even Buffalo and a few Grizzles were around in large number.Nearly a hundred years of unchecked unregulated market hunting along with massive losses of habitat as forests were cleared for farming nearly wiped them all out. By the early 1900s Elk, Buffalo, and Grizzles were gone forever....and the deer and turkey were all but gone. A couple of generations of folks were raised without ever seeing a wild deer or turkey. My dad tells me that when he was a boy in the 1930s the sight of a deer track in the mud was a cause of much excitement. Also in the 1930s the Mo. Conservation Department was established to assist in the effort to save and increase the population of the wildlife that was not already gone. Deer and Turkey were trapped deep in the Ozarks were small populations still existed and relocated to other parts of the state from where they had disappeared. The population slowly gained over the years until by the 1940s it was determined that the deer herd had recovered enough to support a limited hunt in a few select County's. This is known as the States first modern deer hunting season and my grandfather was one of the few who participated in it.......
In the 1940s rural Missouri had still not recovered from the great depression and times were hard....very hard. Many young men enlisted in the military to fight the great war.....many others moved to big city's to work in factory's that supported the war effort. My grandfather tried to enlist but was rejected due to his age and being nearly blind in one eye. Being a woodsman and a farmer he would not - could not -move to a city and work in a factory so he struggled along doing the best he could raising a large family and keeping food on the table during very tough times.He raised most of his own food and worked in the woods hewing railroad ties by hand to make a very few dollars every week. Folks who hewed railroad ties were known as "tie hackers". It was brutal hard physical dangerous work - felling a tree with a axe or saw -then trimming the limbs from it - measuring and sawing it to size-then hewing a square railroad tie from a round log using only a broad axe. It is amazing to me how well they could do this - for sure a lost art. The ties were sold to the railroad for a very small amount of money....a hard weeks work might make you $10.00 or so.....but he was glad to get it and did not expect.....and would have rejected....any offer of government help.....he would have been insulted at the mention of such a thing. (I could make a political comment here but I will resist and get back to the story)
Anyway when he heard of the planned deer season he decided to go....he was in the woods every day and knew where the deer crossed the hollow.....and he figured his family could use the meat. As far as firearms during this first season....there were no laws on what you could use....anything went. Ammunition was very scarce and deer were hunted with everything from .22s to shotguns to civil war era mussel loaders. My grandfather was very lucky in this regard....he had traded for a 1890s era surplus military rifle complete with 3 1890s era bullets. He fired one bullet to see how straight the gun fired and saved 2 for the hunt........he figured he would only need one.
When opening day rolled around Grandpa took his rifle along with his tools and headed out at first light...just as he did every morning except Sunday....(Gods day) He planned to hunt a couple hours in the morning - work through the middle of the day - and hunt a couple more hours in the evening.
As the story was told to me by my father and grandfather almost before he got settled in the woods a HUGE 10 point buck stepped out in the open broadside at close range. Taking careful aim, grandpa squeezes the trigger..........only to have the 50 year old cartridge misfire! At the snap of the misfired cartridge the buck hopped across the ridge and disappeared into the hollow. Grandpas heart sank but he did the only thing he knew to do.....reloaded with his last cartridge and eased down the hollow in the direction the deer had taken.
As he stepped off the ridge -he got lucky- the first thing he saw was the buck standing at the bottom of the hollow looking right at him. Again taking a good aim and squeezing the trigger....this time the gun fired and the monster buck went down!
I would have loved to have seen his reaction at this time but to shorten a long story he field dressed the buck and struggled to drag it up the hill where he hung it from a tree near where he was working and went back to hewing ties.
Word spread about the huge buck that had been taken and before long cars and trucks began appearing down the old logging trail to admire it and congratulate my grandfather. Along toward the middle of the day a new car with a wealthy hunter from St Louis stopped by to look it over.....and offer to buy it.Grandpa laughed at him. Than he offered $100.00 cash.............How could he turn that kind of money down? As much as he disliked the idea he felt he would be letting his family down more by refusing the offer than by accepting probably the most cash money he had seen at one time in his life. He accepted.......grudgingly.
If you check the records of Missouri's first modern deer season.....not many deer were taken. One of the biggest was taken by my grandfather although he will never receive credit for it. 70 years later the story of my grandfathers $100.00 buck is still being told -now to his great great grandchildren. I have his old broad-axe and I sometimes get it out and heft it and remember the proud man who once used it to make a living for his family in rough times. Every time I remember the hunting story I realize how it must have hurt him to sell that deer.....then I realize it was sold not for the love of money....but for the love of his family.
Thanks to all for taking the time to read this old family story.
