Elmer Keith vs. Jack O'Connor

I liked Elmer's approach to big bore magnum handguns. However, I wasn't as enthused with Keith's big bore approach to rifles. I was more drawn to O'Conner's viewpoints on the high velocity side with the 270. In fact, O'Connor caused me to buy a 270 as my first centerfire rifle. Even these days, with all the cartridge selections, you can still do well by picking the 270.

Still, by far, on the handgun side of things Keith's wide use of big bores as well as so many other types of handguns made him my favorite with sidearms. I recall, after Jack O'Connors death, seeing a catalog of his guns and it only listed two handguns. One was a Smith K-22 and the other was a K-38. By comparision, Keith owned and experimented with untold numbers of handguns.

So I guess for my it was O'Connor for rifles and Keith for handguns. As far as their writings, Jack O'Connor was by far the best writer. Thats really no surprise as O'Connor was a college professor while Keith was a semi-literate cowboy. I remember reading that his articles were heavily edited just to get them readable.

Both were a interesting read . I wouldn't dream of choosing one over the other, as they were basically seperate disiplines as pointed out.

Considered as almost gods in the field of firearms writing, they both certainly were among the best in their field. My favorite however has always been Skeeter . All technical stuff aside, or opinion on what is a better widget, the pure intertainment writing style of Skeeter always brought a smile to my face.

I imagine them all sitting around a large fire pit, swapping stories, and drinking good burbon on the rocks .

Didn't Elmer personally dislike and even went out to attack O'Connor personally by means of their caliber wars, rather than on facts?

I tend to agree with brandyspaw's position.

For rifles, I tend to lean more towards O'Connor especially with the new advent of bullets and the newer technology today. The .270 Win is a fine caliber and can even tend to be on the powerful side for most small to medium game in North America.

In handguns, I tend to take a moderate approach when it comes to stopping power. I do not use the heaviest bullets or the fastest calibers. I agree with Keith that wheelguns are the way to go with handguns especially in hunting calibers and when dealing with dangerous game. The .44 Magnum is just about as heavy a caliber as you need for most hunting with the exception of the most dangerous game. When it comes to human stopping power though a heavy .38 Special +P, .357 Magnum, .40 S&W, or the .45 ACP are tops though. The .41 Magnum, 10mm, and .44 Magnum tend to be too overpowered especially in urban environments.

I am not trying to start a caliber debate, just trying to state examples that I agree with between the two gentleman.

On a side note, I have an Elmer Keith book and in the back of it there are letters to and from Keith and O'Connor. They wrote some rather nasty letters to each other at times. There was another gentleman that wrote some letters to Keith taking O'Connors' positions (I cannot remember his name off the top of my head) and the letters tended to take the same tone in them.

Keith's emphasis on big bore rifles was the product of his time and experience. If I were hunting big game fifty or 75 years ago, I would also want to have a platform emphasizing caliber over velocity. The expanding rounds of the period were pretty primitive, and notoriously unreliable on big game. O'Connor's approach was more forward looking.

That said, the two were both experienced hunters and had far more views in common than different.

I've read and reread both. However I owe a debt to Jack O'Connor. I had dyslexia, and only learned to read by reading O'Connor.

Well over the years I've managed to collect many of Elmers books, while buying only one of Jack O'Connors. Elmer was one hell of a STORY TELLER, Jack was one hell of a lecturer. I always feel like I'm being talked down to when I read Jack. Could be the fact O'Connor was a College Prof. To me reading Keith is like sitting down with an old buddy over a cold brew and BS'ing about hunting and firearms. While many of his theories about calibres and bullet weights are no longer valid, I'll take a Keith story any day.

Keith and O'Connor rarely communicated directly, rather Truman Fowler was the go between Keith and O'Connor.

I love reading Keith for the same reasons, Cain R. Always entertaining as well as providing Elmer's view on calibers, velocities, and bullet construction.
I always felt that he had a pretty unassailable position, that bigger bullets at higher velocities will kill better and quicker. I disagree that he opted for "lower velocities". Only because he couldn't push them faster did he settle for lower velocity in bigger bullets. What he really wanted was big AND fast bullets.
My "reading" experience has confirmed that the old slow, big calibers did not suffer from lack of efficiency. They also did not depend on "proper" expansion to make the hit effective.
Even today, people will often turn to the .45-70 when they want a caliber that is good "grizzly medicine".
Any question as to what handguns are carried in "Bear Country"? Big calibers, heavy solid bullets, driven as fast as possible. Not small caliber fast bullets of expanding construction.
I love Elmer. Still. Lots of folks call him uninformed and a blowhard. Not me. Those that say that he was "full of it" are themselves often uninformed in my opinion.
They tend to be the type of folks that often believe revolvers are outmoded, and have no real purpose in the gun world simply because of capacity. Elmer knew better.

I honestly rarely read Keith when he was actively writing in magazines as I was not interested in handguns and I couldn't have afforded the big bores anyway. I was a kid. O'Connor; I chose a 270 as my first true deer rifle (actually followed a 243). I read his stuff and have a few of his books. These days, I'm more interested in Keith and have started to read his old stuff when I find it. Cosmoline's comment that O'Connor was more forward looking is accurate especially if you look at history. I was already looking at guns when I was 8-10 years old and had memorized most of the models and the specs on guns I was interested in. I bet the teachers really liked my doodles... guns.

Elmer Keith got the very first handgunner award given by Gun Digest folks. He was a classic!!

O'Connor was more literate but Keith was more real. He wouldn't advise doing something unless he tried it himself and proved it worked. Both Elmer and Chas Askins, Jr. wrote things like "JO shot most of his game over the sights of his Olympia (typewriter).

Both were interesting reads.

I don't think O'Connor was really light and fast, rather he felt that:

A. Everyone has a limit to their recoil tolerance.
B. You shouldn't be trying to guess hold-over at range.

For most people doing long range shooting that would mean using a gun with a light and fast bullet.

"I liked Elmer's insistence on slower, heavier bullets "

Not quite. Elmer liked bg and heavy bullets. It is a fact they can't be driven as fast as a lighter, for caliber, bullet but he worked to get all the velocity he could. Example, the .44 Mag for handguns was basically due to his efforts.

As a hunting guide, Elmer saw more game shot than any individual hunter, O'conner included. He knew what worked most often and what failed most often. He hunted his own game on his own feet and strove to put the game down as quickly as possible, that took large holes that bled freely. He was right too, I learned it from them.

Jack was a "gentleman" hunter, almost always led by a guide into the mountains he prefered. His shots were often long and across mountain gaps where the range and wind was a huge factor. He was an excellant game shot and could put the bullet in the right place, consistantly, so he was well served with the lighter, faster and flatter shooting rounds. He was right too.

We who read them often love both for the accurate info they provide as well as the storys they told. I am sure I would have respected O'Conner but I would have loved Elmer if I could have known them. We only need the experience to recognise which parts of what we read applies to our own hunting.

Most of my days afield are in forested areas where few shots past 125 yards are possible, so a 336/.35 with big bullets and low power scope are usually my choice. On those rare occasions I might get a shot beyond 150 yards I change rifles and cartridges and scopes. I learned from both men and now I'm right too.

I grew up knowing Mr. O'Connor personally through my Grandfather's gun shop, he was a true believer in the 270 and as someone said earlier he was what made that caliber happen. I didn't know Mr. Keith but I do know Mr. O'Connor was a very good shot and I don't believe he would wright about something he didn't do, I know he had Ethics because I have seen him not take a shot on a bull elk that was huge and that he had followed for several days because it was standing on the ridge of a hill and he wasn't confidant of the back stop. True he drank a little some might say a lot but he was always straight as far as I could see.

I've read and reread both. However I owe a debt to Jack O'Connor. I had dyslexia, and only learned to read by reading O'Connor.

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Bet you had a world of trouble trying to locate a rifle in .072.

O'Connor

O'Connor was a longe range shooter. He wasn't just interested in caliber or bullet weight per se. He was more interested in a cartridge that would do the job with a flat trajectory. He settled on the .270 as his favorite because with the right bullets loaded properly it has a very flat trajectory compared to some others such as the 30-06, but still has sufficient terminal ballistics to take down a big mulie or even an elk. Many didn't believe the .270 was up to the task so Jack spent a lot of time demonstrating the worth of the .270, vindicating his selection.
Elmer Keith, on the other hand, was more noted as a handgunner and an experimenter with large caliber heavy bullets driven as fast as possible. Hence his development of several .44 bullets in the .240 grain range and hot loads for the .44 Special, that morphed in due course into the .44 Magnum. Elmer really didn't like the .357, even though he was instrumental in its development, preferring the big stuff. Bill Jordan, another great writer, became one of the main proponents of that cartridge.

Elmer has a spot in my heart but the guy I miss most and I learned the most from and had the most laughs was bill jordan I saw him at a few get togathers and was at one of his pistol courses and have read about everything the guy ever wrote. He was good friends with Mr. Keith and hunted with him lots. Man to go hunting with those two would have been a dream come true.

Elmer

What you have read in Elmer's books and in magazines are not Elmer's writings.
He may have put the ideas and thoughts down on paper but someone else did the reworks.
I used to have several letters hand written by him to me and they were full of mis-spelling and not correct in the way they were written.
He was an uneducated cowboy but very smart in the ways that really matter in life.
Elmer had to work for everything he did or got and Jack more or less had things handed to him by Outdoor Life after he began writing for them.
How ever, I used to dote on both and tried to read everything from them.
I also had a third hero back then, Charles Askins. What a man and what a life he lived!

I am an Elmer fan as well, and also am a large bore fan. Elmers writings were
rustic and interesting. And imho the 270 stinks as a cartridge.

Jack O'Connor.

I think G&A, recently reprinted a bunch of its old articles. Included were Askins' famous article knocking revolvers as being old technology, and Jordan's "Come Now, Charlie" rebuttal.

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Just read it
Great stuff!