I've searched for books by Elmer Keith and Skeeter Skelton and find that the least expensive copies are WAY out of my price range.

I just bought a used "The Old Man and the Boy" online for $3.99. It doesn't have to be THAT cheap. What recommended books about guns and shooting can I find for $20 to $30 or under?

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"He was kinda funny lookin'"

I bought "Sixguns" by Elmer on amazon but it was a reprint with a paperback cover for something like $20. this was several years ago

I've got Elmer Keith's "Hell, I Was There!" Hardcover, nice shape, dust jacket. 8" by 11". Would sell for $30 plus postage from 84094. Contact by P.M. if interested.

You can often find books by Jack O'Connor, Frank Buck, Sasha Siemel, etc. for reasonable prices at used book stores. The people who run those shops have no idea that they're anything but old books; very few such people are into guns or hunting or outdoor adventure.

Ditto for books on sharks, Bigfoot, etc.

I once paid $140 for a Jim Corbett book at a specialty dealer. He knew what it was. Had I found it at Half Price Books, I'd have probably paid under $10.

That is a good price for Hell, I was There, in post #3.

I use abebooks.com for used books. It ties together used bookstores, primarily English language, from across the world. I just checked and Sixguns, by Keith, is currently available for under $3. Hell I was There, cheapest is a bit under $60.

It pays to keep checking, too, because good deals will pop up and give you a chance to pounce.

Happy hunting!

This is a fantastic book source that I've used for years. Most Popular Items - HamiltonBook.com

Anyone who won't buy, "Sixguns" at that price and read it CAREFULLY before asking questions on a board like this doesn't deserve to have his questions answered! That book and, "The Handgun", by Geoffrey Boothroyd are so useful and basic that any gun enthusiast who doesn't own both is simply delinquent in his basic firearms education.

If necessary, skip a meal out, a movie, or a football game and get those books!

BTW, the reason why I paid so much for that Corbett book (see post No. 4) was to get an original edition in hardback. If I was willing to tolerate some sloppy printing errors, I could have paid about $12 and gotten a recent reprint from Oxford University Press in India. But I wanted a better quality book that was collectible and had nostalgic value to me. If you just want to read his books and understand why he was considered such a remarkable hero, you can get that in cheaper form. Bear in mind that his gallantry and jungle acumen were so legendary that the forward to one of his books was written by the Viceroy of India! (This was the ruling British official in New Delhi prior to Indian independence in 1947.) I can think offhand of only one other instance where an official of comparable importance personally endorsed a hunting book. That person was the President of the United States. Do you know which President and whose book he endorsed, even inspired? Have you read that book?

Watch your local book stores. I just bought "Hell, I was there" for $10.00, it is a hardbacked reprint with a nice dustjacket. Deals are out there. I also picked up a 1946 edition of Jim Corbett's "MAN-EATERS OF KUMAON" at a local Friends of the Library sale $2.00.

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USMC 69-93 Combat Pistol Inst.

T-Star, I am thinking the president has got to be TR, but as to whose hunting book he wrote the forward to... Now that has me stumped!

If I am right about TR, who died in 1919, and if he inspired the book, then we're looking for a hunting book written prior to that...

Hmmmm.

How about American Big Game Hunting; The Book of the Boone and Crockett Club? TR, along with George Bird Grinnel, edited it and wrote the forward. An anthology published in 1893. I read it some years ago, and it is in my library. I believe it is in this book that TR talks about the Winchester M94 as a powerful new rifle. Of course he wasn't president yet, at that point, and the book does not have one author, so I don't think it qualifies.

More likely, I think, is a book about hunting in Africa or possibly South America...

Dr. Onomea-

You 're getting warm. Think Africa. And, yes, it was TR. I think he met the author at the Explorers' Club in NYC and urged him to write a book about his experiences in a certain situation.

Also, I didn't associate TR with the Winchester M-94, although he may well have liked it. He's better known for the M-95, which he and son Kermit used extensively in Africa. If memory serves, he didn't detail the caliber of Kermit's example in .30, just saying that it was for the Army ctg. That could mean the .30/40, the.30-03 or the .30-06!

TR had one in .405.

This will probably be a giveaway, but the author was a recipient of the Victoria Cross, although not for anything to do with the book.

T-Star:

Big Medicine. That's what he called his M-95 in .405.

Well, other than the fact that my own copy does not include a forward by him, TR (AKA Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt), although the forward does indeed mention his encouraging the writing of the book, I'd say:

The Man-Eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures, by J.H. Patterson.

Then again, perhaps he wrote a forward in a different edition?

(Did you enjoy the movie "The Ghost and the Darkness," 1996, by the way? I thought the suspense done well.)

For those unfamiliar with the historical background to the book and movie I mention, here ya go: Tsavo Man-Eaters - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You nailed it. I think some editions do include a forward by TR and he strongly encouraged Patterson to write the book.

I haven't seen the version covering additional man-eaters. Just read, "The Man-Eaters of Tsavo."

I did see the movie you noted and felt that Michael Douglas about ruined it. Patterson was not well done. There was no Remington, the rustic character created for Douglas as an ego role. There were PC issues that I can't comment on here.

But, boy, were those lions scary!

Here's a Amazon page with Ed McGivern and Bill Jordon for dirt cheap used if your interested in revolvers
As far as I know Skeeters book have never been reprinted so the bring big bucls

Half Price books has a some good ones every now and then.