I am too young to have grown up reading Keith or O'Connor. I grew up reading Carmichael though and always enjoyed his writings. One specific article that struck me was "Wind, Wolves and the Golden Boys." He is a big reason I grew up enfatuated with the .338WM...and the .260Rem. I always thought he was a class act.
My wife is from Idaho and while visiting family a couple of years ago we checked out the O'Connor center. It was great and I picked up several pieces of his works while I was there. I loved his writings too.
I gradually started picking up some of Keith's works over the last couple of years too. He amazes me. Not for his remarkable skill but his sheer tenacity. The knowledge he had was completely based on living in his time, in his wilderness and on his ranches. That is experience so many of us will never have or even have an opportunity to gather. Instead we depend on literature.
Neither Keith nor O'Connor were truly remarkable shots in my opinion though. Each have written extensively about the shots they miss and walk into game. Practices like this would be highly criticized if today's writers printed such. Instead, practice at the range is preached so single, accurate shots can be taken. Practice wasn't touted so much in older writings, probably because of cost factors and "wasting ammo" in bleak economic times. Could I have done as well in the field next to them? Probably not,
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My biggest influence though comes from my Uncle first, the man who really introduced me to hunting, and social communities secondly. Sites such as this have moulded my thought processes more than any single thing up to now.
