What more can be said of Elmer Keith that hasn’t already been written, re-written, chewed up and spit out about his many hunting feats and handloading innovations? From mold design to gun development, including helping design the Winchester Model 70 in 1939, his contributions are undeniable.
Keith got his start as a writer with American Rifleman, the NRA’s flagship publication when Chancey Thomas asked him to report on the Camp Perry matches he participated in as a National Guardsman in 1929. The rest, they say, is history.
Keith contributed to American Rifleman for years before his name graced the masthead as a staff writer, a position he maintained for the next eight years. Things were going smoothly until he got a new editor. Besides editing, he started changing Keith’s script on his accounts, unintentionally making him look like a fool.
In one article, the editor changed a bull elk into a caribou from one paragraph to another. In another, he changed a 450-pound goat to a 150-pounder. The old timers in Salmon, Idaho, chided Keith, putting their arm around him and saying, “Elmer, why didn’t you just kick that little kid (goat) off the ledge?
Keith said he was constantly asked why he was “writing the way he did” and explained the situation with the new editor. “The people then went after the editor, and he, in turn, jumped on me, and I told him he’d h have to accept the blame for any changes he made to my material.”
Keith was paid $400 monthly from American Rifleman, where his duties included answering 300-500 letters each month, in addition to writing his column.
Bev Mann, who was a former Rifleman editor, offered Keith a column for $150 per month as well as the arms assignments for GUNS Magazine. The staff for American Rifleman didn’t like Keith writing for another publication. They removed his name from the main masthead and instead changed it to contributing editor in small print at the bottom.
Things sour fast, leading Keith to accept the offer from GUNS Magazine.
Keith explained to American Rifleman’s technical editor, General Hatcher, that he had no intention to stop writing for the publication, telling him he wanted to make it his life work. When they objected to him writing for two publications, Keith told them they better read his contract, which allowed him to write for any and all magazines.
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