Who Shot First?

By Brian W. Bethell

This is Brian and his dad in elk camp in the Ukiah unit in 2017. Its 7 degrees and still they have smiles on their faces. They didn’t get an elk that year but they did get this picture together.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 29, 2019
• ISBN: 9781796030228

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Copyright © 2019 by Brian W. Bethell.

Library of Congress Control Number:    2019905108

ISBN:                  Hardcover                        978-1-7960-3024-2

                            Softcover                          978-1-7960-3023-5

                            eBook                                978-1-7960-3022-8

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 04/27/2019

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CONTENTS

Dedication

Introduction

Preface

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

DEDICATION

I dedicate this to my dad.

Thank you, dad, for showing me the things that make life great and for sharing the best moments of it with me. Thank you for teaching me how to hunt and fish and enjoy the outdoors. Thank you for believing in me and helping me grow up to be a man.

I love you, Hoss

Thank you too mom, for taking care of dad all these years. I love you.

INTRODUCTION

Brian and his dad hunted and fished all over the great state of Oregon. They made memories to last a lifetime. They fished for sturgeon in the mighty Columbia river up near Astoria, they shot ducks in the gorge near Bonneville Dam, they killed elk in the Umatilla National Forest and pheasants in Ontario at the Idaho border, they called in coyotes out by Malheur Lake and earmarked some jack rabbits near Fort Rock, they chased deer down by Grants Pass and caught crabs out of Yaquina bay, they fished for trout in the high lakes of the Cascades mountains and they stood on top of the South Sister, they walked around Pete French’s barn and they floated down the Umpqua river. They covered the state from corner to corner during their adventures together.

PREFACE

Brian walked out of the trees onto the road, the sun was shinning in his face as he looked both ways. Which way? Where was he? He tried the walkie talkie but only got static. Brian turned left and shouldered his gun and started walking. After about a quarter mile or so he saw is dad standing outside the RAV4 they were hunting out of. When he reached his dad, they talked about what each one had seen and heard, nothing was the answer for both. They sat in the RAV4 and drank some water and ate a candy bar, his dad’s favorite thing. They talked about what their next move would be. Both agreed that getting a sandwich and soda back at camp was a good start. It was late in the afternoon and they planned to sit and watch the meadows, a place where Brian’s dad Wayne had shot and killed an elk a few years before. It was a good spot and watching it in the evening just before it got dark seemed like a good plan. It was on the way back to camp that it happened, the shot that both of them would remember forever.

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CHAPTER 1

Both Brian and his dad Wayne grew up in Oregon, the Willamette valley and coastrange mountains. Wayne started hunting and fishing in his teenage years. While he enjoyed being outdoors hunting, fishing was his favorite thing to do. Fishing from a boat I should say, Wayne probably owed 100 boats over the years. This was no joke. He had big ones, small ones, wooden ones, aluminum ones, some with motors, some he had to row and even one that he raced. There was always a future used new boat in Wayne’s life. Wayne loved to get in his boat and go fishing. He loved leaving the dock and taking off out across the water and turning to see the wake the boat made behind him, another one of his favorite things. It didn’t matter if it was the ocean, a lake or a river, if he could get his boat to it, he would fish it. Some people say he damn near fished every river and lake in the state of Oregon. That’s the kind of stuff legends are made of. He caught every kind of fish there was to catch, big ones, small ones and everything in between. Legend has it he even lost a few too. As if that wasn’t enough, he started carving them out of wood in his spare time of retirement. He just couldn’t get enough of fishing.

When it came to hunting and the outdoors Wayne mainly hunted Black tailed deer and Rocky mountain elk. He also shot upland game birds as well. Ducks, geese, pheasant, quail and partridge were all on his radar and all fed his family at one time or another throughout the year. Deer and elk were his favorite, just not in that order. Deer hunting in coast range mountains where they lived was wet business. It always rained in the fall and winter and to get a deer you had to get wet. Weekends during deer season were spent driving old gravel roads and walking old logging roads in search of deer and always during the rain. More seasons than not Wayne came home with a deer and meat for his family. But elk hunting, that was what he loved. The mountains, the campfires, the hunting partners, the thrill of the chase and tracking an animal. These were things he looked forward to every fall for many years. Wayne passed these hunting and fishing passions on to his only son Brian. As the years went by, he and Brian would hunt and fish all over the state of Oregon.

Brian’s first memories of shooting were at a gravel pit near their home when he was about 12 years old. He would shoot at old spray paint cans that his dad would set up on rocks. Another time when Brian was about that age, he and his dad would take a trip over to eastern Oregon to an abandoned old mill town down by the John Day river. The old town has often been remembered so many times that Brian’s memories of it are worn.