The Wyoming Schuetzen Union’s “Center Shot”

Like the great preponderance of magazine display advertisements, the Savage Arms Corporation advertisement appearing in the June, 1922, Saturday Evening Post was given an instants’ cursory glance before its reader moved on. Eminently overlookable in a general interest monthly magazine, we might suppose that the same advertisement in that month’s number of Field & Stream might have gotten a slightly better reception than the typically dismissive “just another ad” assessment.

The Savage advertisement was seemingly a retrospective reference harking back to a long ago and far away mention that was not within the memory of the bulk of the magazine’s readership. Clearly the image of the hunter sporting an entirely buckskin wardrobe was dated, and his lever action rifle somewhat so. The hunter’s eyebrow-raising claim, “I’ll bet $50 I can shoot through a grizzly endwise with my .303 Savage” might have had some unsuspecting takers in its time.

Those few who actually considered the advertisement must have sifted, in their mind’s eye, through the obstacles that a bullet encounters in traversing six feet or more of bear hide, muscle, and organs, together with the likelihood of bone. More incredulous to them must have been someone’s apparent willingness – and even eagerness – to bet a month’s wages on a successful outcome against such dicey circumstances.

At the 1922 exposure, viewers must have sensed that the advertisement referred to a revival of some sort. Savage’s marketing department hit a creative home run; this was an imaginative and captivating piece of advertising. For some reason, though, it had a short run.

Savage’s magazine advertising liked to focus on successful bear hunters. Bears may have conveyed a marketable sense of potency that antlered game could not. In the mix of .303’ed bears, there was also a tiger, an elephant, and an Inuit’s kill – a whale of some description.

 

The 1922 advertisement alluded to the year 1899, a date when smokeless powder was still regarded suspiciously. The man behind the bet was E. E. Jones of Townsend, Montana. There was significance to the advertisement, and to Mr. Jones, and some possible benefit to bring the matter before the public again 23 years later. In the long stretch of years since 1922, this minor episode in rifleman’s history has never been examined. It’s about time this changed.

Jones’ section of Montana was alive with an abundance of black and grizzly bears. In fact, there was no shortage of bears of any sort within the whole of the mountainous West, and the day’s sporting magazine devoted disproportionate space and ink to the very popular pastime of bear hunting. Gun makers, too, seized the same opportunity and put a bruin’s focus on their magazine advertisements.

Buckskin seems to have been the preferred bear-hunting garb. Almost to an individual, the successful, thoroughly up-to-date, Model of 1899 bear hunters were wearing buckskin as if it was the bear hunter’s regulation uniform.

Savage’s quote attributed to E. E. Jones in the 1922 advertisement was actually an example of the necessarily tight paraphrasing to satisfy the rigid requirements of the Savage advertisement man. Those of us who glance casually at a magazine advertisement seldom are held by more than its illustration, but the Savage advertisement also appealed because of the likely back-story it suggested.

Hunters of bears, and indeed sportsmen of every description, found fellowship and a forum in Recreation magazine. First issued in 1894, founder George O. Shields struck his editorial stride in short order. By 1899, his several page "Guns and Ammunition" column was a monthly forum for the exchange of opinions and the broadcasting of the preferences of our ancestral rifle crank. The section was comprised of reader’s letters that simply must have been edited for length and clarity. At first it was a model of civility and decorum. There was a palpable mutual respect and a regard for the differences of brother sportsmen.

Inevitably, personality was allowed to creep in little by little, and the column degraded into a hotbed of discord, accusation and name-calling. The word on the street was that this bickering was editorially instigated and promoted. Conflict has always sold. By allowing it, Editor Shields stirred the pot, promoted the bad behavior and watched it get out of hand to the point of disgrace.

Several of Recreation’s regulars were positively insufferable. They seemed to delight in being purposefully antagonistic, contrary and fault-finding. They did this seemingly for the sake of being disruptive for whatever sport or satisfaction there was in doing it. All along, it needs to be noted, Editor Shields had the option of rejecting letters he saw as being objectionable.

Smokeless powder had rather suddenly revolutionized the whole of the sporting and shooting scenes. For better or for worse, a new twentieth century mood was astir. The change was hard to embrace and not everyone was inclined to keep up with the times. “Old School” and “New School” divided into separate camps with a healthy “No School” population inhabiting the generously wide center area.

Converting to the smokeless camp was often a matter of self-education, sifting through the letters of those who professed to know and allowing one’s self to be swayed. If you relied upon the magazine columns for guidance, it behooved a person to be careful. Those who would be thought of as the “last word” often weren’t. It didn’t take long to sort them out. Recreation’s resident big bore proponent and hardest-blowing blowhard used the pseudonym “Grizzly Pete,” and mailed his letters from the Buffalo River, Idaho, post office.

Pete, it seems, was the sort of individual to put his full and unguarded character on display for Recreation’s readership to assess. In 1898, Pete told them of his annual bear hunt when he happened upon a sow grizzly with two cubs and a two-year old in tow. He headshot each bear with his trusty 45-70 Winchester lever gun, and proceeded to cut the paws from each animal and headed for home. After this experience Pete felt qualified to speak with authority from the big-bore stance, while denouncing the modern smokeless .30 calibers that were all the rage. “Did you ever try the small bore?” asked one reader, an apparent newcomer to the frays at Recreation’s pages.

Later, Pete included another episode where he stood at the open door of his cabin and killed nine cow elk with 10 shots. The 10th cow escaped gut-shot and couldn’t be counted with the dead. Pete was not bashful about adding this accompanying disclosure: “…and the Lord only knows how many legs I broke in the bunch.”

Recreation subscribers shared a common opinion of Grizzly Pete. In 1900, one summarized and spoke for the masses: “It is all right to jump on Grizzly Pete; he is an unprincipled scoundrel and deserves all he gets.” Another was slightly more courteous with his terse verdict: “First class hunters do not kill cow elk.”

A 300-word communication from a reader was printed on page 208 of the September, 1899, number of Recreation. It was over the signature of our Mr. E.E. Jones and postmarked Townsend, Montana. The editor furnished its title: “Grizzly Pete and the Savage.”

Jones opened bluntly. He had shot his share of bears – and he knew.

Straightaway he made his point: “I will make this proposition to Pete: I will bet him $50 that I can shoot through a grizzly endwise with my .303 Savage, and that he cannot do the same with his .45-70. Further, I can knock away more of the grizzly’s skull in one shot than he can in ten with his .45-70.” That being said, and the point made, the tone changed to what amounted to a virtual handshake extension from one sportsman to another. Jones encouraged his fellow Westerner to stop in and “lock horns” on the subject. Jones put his cordiality on sincere display when he added, “My latch string is always hanging on the outside, Pete, and we will 'labor together.'” Readers of Recreation, in particular, had every reason to expect a different type of demeanor.

A more peaceable Grizzly Pete made an appearance in the January, 1900 Recreation to introduce his new companion “Gill.” The pair of New Century sportsmen had a fishing report to file from Jackson, Wyoming. Pete also announced his new status of recovering game hog, one who no longer had the urge to “kill every blamed varmint just ‘cause I want to shoot off the old .45-70 and see ‘em drop.”

Neither player, Grizzly Pete or E.E. Jones lingered on the Recreation scene for long after that. In late 1899, Grizzly Pete suddenly disappeared without notice, explanation, or anyone to mourn his absence. E.E. Jones appears to have had but a single contribution to the Recreation forum and this, his taunting and well-aimed proposal of September, 1899, together with his stern admonition of Grizzly Pete personally and his out-of-date views.

Savage’s model in its 1922 advertisement, presumably representing E.E. Jones bedecked in full and proper buckskin regalia, may have jolted memories of Recreation’s antics of a generation previously. The gun maker’s advertisement in Field & Stream – a marvel of creativity – may have been its last gasp to revitalize sales of the moribund 303 Savage rifle at the same time its modern 300 Savage was newly on the market. It seems safe to assume that the Savage advertising staff knew what it was doing. Now, our present generation is made aware of the back-story – and the rest of the story, as well!