- Did you know? (Andrew Holmberg)
Andrew Holmberg was among of the younger generation of hunters in East Africa. He was born in Kenya in 1918 of Swedish Parents.
Karen Blixen was the midwife and become his god – mother. Holmberg hunted extensively in East Africa before relocating of Botswana. Praised by both clients and professionals, he holds the record for the greatest number of 100 – pounds – plus elephant tusks, 63 of which were for family, friend and clients.
- Did you Know (William Cotton oswell)
William cotton oswell (1818 – 1893) was renowned for elephant hunting and who also doubled up as an explorer. Accompanied by Mungo Murray, Oswell made an expedition to the interior of Africa, during which he met with the explorer David Livingstone. In 1849, the three of them discovered lake Ngami, for which livingtone eventually took sole credit.
- Did you Know? ( Walter D.M. Bell)
Walter D.M. Bell was famous elephant hunter in East Africa as well as a particularly intrepid adventurer who was known as Karamoja Bell. The nick name resulted from his extra ordinary elephant hunting exploits in the Karamoja province of Uganda as well as Ethiopia, Central Africa, and West Africa. He recounted his bush experiences in his wanderings of an Elephant hunter, a series of essays and stories written at the apex of his career.
- Did you Know? (Captain Francis A. Dickinson)
- Captain Francis Arthur Dickinson (1874 – 1915), a British army officer who was also a fellow of the Royal Geographical society and a first – Class big game hunter, after the Boer war in South Africa, was selected as Winston churchill’s escort When the future prime minister was sent to British East Africa as the under secretary of state for the colonies.
- Did you Know? (Harry Selby)
- Harry selby, Holmberg’s earlier partner, who was born in 1925 and participated in his first safari in 1945 under the tutelage of Philip percival, was reputed to be a resilient hunter. Between 1945 and 2000, he hunted each season without break, and made the record as the longest operating professional hunter ever. Among Selby’s earlier partners was Ken Randall, his older cousin, with whom he hunted elephants in northern Kenya towards the end of world war II. According to the book (The enormous 200 by colinwillock, Randall later diversified into catching game). The Hollywood movie Hatari, in which superstar John wayne played Randall, were based on the Randall family of hunters and game catchers. The wider Randall family was involved in several other films, including where no vultures fly, Mogambo, Born Free and Joy Adamson’s popular Born Free TV services.
- Did you Know? (Natasha Illum Berg)
Natasha illum Berg was among the modern hunters in East Africa. She was born in 1971 and came from a Swedish family that had generations of hunters, explorers and wildlife conservationists. Involved in wildlife Management at an early age, Natasha moved to Africa at the age of 18, and after obtaining her professional hunter (PH) Licence in 1993 becoming the only Licenced female big game hunter in East Africa. She lives in Tanzania and she has written several books. - Did you Know? (Norfolk Hotel in Nairobi)
1934 was the year whereas hunters met at the Norfolk Hotel in Nairobi on April 12, 1934 and founded the East African professional Hunter Association to Lobby for wildlife conservation. The founders included Sydney Downey and Donald Ker, who later became partners in the famous Ker and Downey safaris company. They, together with others, later lobbied for the establishment of a game reserve covering the maasaimara triangle, a proposal Kenya’s chief gane warden supported. Downey and Ker also lobbied for a similar reserve across the border in the Serengeti of the then Tanganyika colony. The members of the association also pushed for laws protecting the females of each species, banning night hunting and the use of dogs. Also prohibited in the early days was the sale of game meat and the shooting of animals with in proximity of watering holes or safari vehicles. They called for the creation of conservation areas for East African Wildlife.
- Did you Know? (John Alexander Hunter)
John Alexander Hunter was prominent among East Africa’s professional hunters. He was born in 1887. A friend of Denys Frinch Hatton, he built the famous Hunter’s Lodge in 1958 at Makindu, Kenya, where he died in 1963. Having arrived in Kenya from Scotland in 1908, Hunter held several world records for big game hunting at various times. He is particularly remembered for having Killed more than 1000 rhinos in Kenya. He carried out this feat between August 26, 1944 and October 31, 1946 at the behest of the colonial government, which wanted to obtain land for the resettlement of the Akamba people. It turned out that the selected land was useless for human settlement.. Besides safaris and control operations for the Kenya Game department, the appropriately named hunter also wrote books, some autobiographical and some fictional, based ob his life experience. Among of them were Hunter, an autobiography, and the Hunter’s Tracks, a collection of personal reminiscences.
