Meet the Founder
My earliest recollection of hunting and the outdoors is myself as a small boy, and my grandfather sitting on the bench seat of his GMC pick-up truck in the mid 1960's. I remember sharing the front seat with his old Remington shotgun while we deer hunted on our families 2,500 acre hunting lease in North East Florida. Now for anyone not familiar with deer hunting in North East Florida, it is not exactly considered premier quality habitat by any stretch of the imagination. But that really didn't matter to us we just looked forward to going to the woods each weekend and sharing the fellowship,camaraderie and good times with our uncles,cousins and a few close family friends.
We had our own private hunting camp on the property that was established in the late 1950's. It had been added-on to and improved over the years since it was built, it was a special place.Almost everything we did revolved around the hunting camp.From eating and sleeping to making plans for the next days hunt. At night most of the older fellas would play cards but us youngsters gravitated towards the fire barrel to laugh, cut-up and have a good time under the stars.I still remember the smell of the fire as a raging fat lighter stump turned a 55 gallon fire barrel white hot.We swapped hunting stories and rehashed the days events and you could always count on someone falling victim to a practical joke. Little did we know that these would be the days of our lives.
I guess you could say that our family was made up of rough and tumble genuine southern rednecks...and proud of it. My Dad was one of the unspoken leaders of the camp.He was the kinda guy that didn't wait for others to initiate a work project and he knew every aspect of what it took to run a hunting camp. Whether it was cooking breakfast for a crowd of 20 people or organizing a drive for the dogs, my Dad had it handled. Growing up in an average lower middle class family we were never rich but my two younger brothers and I were very fortunate in one aspect of our life.We didn't have to depend on a sports heroes or a movie star as a role model. We all wanted to be just like our Dad when we grew up. In our minds he could out hunt, out fish and out shoot the guys we read about in "Field-a-Stream" magazine. He could crush the head of a ball-pin hammer with his bare hands. He was good to us and we knew he loved by his unselfish actions and the time he invested with us. He taught us respect and how to pitch in and help with the chores.
Several of my great-uncles and extended family friends were WWII veterans. The Vietnam War was beginning to escalate but that seemed a world away to us boys. We had old military surplus willy's jeeps and pick-ups trucks that would crawl through clay bogs and deep wash-outs before 4x4's were cool.We hauled water from an artisan well and chowed-down on fresh killed deer meat. I do however, wish I could forget the smell of the camp's out-house. It was great skipping the bath tub for a few days during the holiday season when school was out. I also remember the dreaded last day of the hunting season when the only good thing to come out of it was that we got to burn our left over unused ammo and wait until next season to do it all over again.
Several of my great-uncles and extended family friends were WWII veterans. The Vietnam War was beginning to escalate but that seemed a world away to us boys. We had old military surplus willy's jeeps and pick-ups trucks that would crawl through clay bogs and deep wash-outs before 4x4's were cool.We hauled water from an artisan well and chowed-down on fresh killed deer meat. I do however, wish I could forget the smell of the camp's out-house. It was great skipping the bath tub for a few days during the holiday season when school was out. I also remember the dreaded last day of the hunting season when the only good thing to come out of it was that we got to burn our left over unused ammo and wait until next season to do it all over again.
Since the days of my innocence as a young boy and a teenager I have traveled down some very dark roads and taken many wrong turns on the path of life but the greatest gift my "Father" ever gave me was was sharing the word of God with me...THANKS DAD! John 3:8
My Name Is William Henry Burns IV
I am a powerful,responsible,committed and peaceful man
My life's purpose is sharing God's love through nature.
