The Modest Lives Of Gunners & Fishermen

An issue of Conservation News in a 1946 publicity leaflet of the National Wildlife Federation, stated that the "sportsmen of America are a pretty modest group," and that, "dollar for dollar put into their hunting and fishing, they get less publicity, less public interest and less projects than any other sport." Gunners and fishermen, it is pointed out, spend $60,207,318 for guns, ammunition, fishing tackle and other related equipment. In contrast, all other sports, from baseball to croquet, use S61.647.986 for equipment. Most of these other sporting activities, the article protests, receive vast publicity in newspapers and magazines, while many hours of radio time are given to baseball, football and prize fights, "yet only occasionally is there brief mention of hunting and fishing " This, the Federation organ feels, is because hunting and fishing are not organized as commercial sports, and should not be.

The item adds: "If we could reduce to public interest these projects for wildlife perpetuation, if we could catch the public eye with the vast importance of wildlife management, our sport, too, could get the attention in the press and over the air that it richly deserves." This question of more publicity for hunting and fishing is also worrying the Outdoor Writers Association of America, which is predominantly an organization of rod and gun editors. This group is actively at work to get a more generous allotment of newspaper space for the writings of their members, on the ground that publishers and editorial directors are unappreciative of the extent of public interest in hunting and fishing. First as to the Federation's plea.

Modesty has never popularly been regarded as an attribute of the gunner, or the fisherman, and certainly they are not modest in claiming rather more than their share of the country's wildlife, supposedly the property of all the people. So far as publicity is concerned, there are several extremely successful hunting and fishing magazines, with large circulation, and loaded, cover-to-cover, with profitable advertising of guns, ammunition, fishing tackle, sport clothing and liquor. No other sport supports any such comparably successful magazines. Citation of t h e equipment investment for baseball and football ignores the fact that their money significance derives from the fact that they are essentially spectator sports.

Others of the sports require expensive links, courts, rinks, gymnasiums, alleys and slides, all of which do not come under the head of "equipment." By and large, the gunner uses the public land, or some individual's land, for his sport, and the fishermen the streams, paying mighty modest license fees to the States for the privilege. Figures can be made to prove many, many things. Comparing hunting and fishing with other sporting activities - even listing them together with golf, baseball, football and croquet - is questionable.

By: davidbunch

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