I was a decent high school athlete. But that was all ... decent. I never attempted to play an organized sport until eighth grade, when I went out for junior high basketball. I didn’t make the team. Instead, I became a wrestler, and along with football — you guessed it — had a decent ...

As ice starts to form on the lake, the days get shorter and the ski season is upon us, I’m reminded of the winter of 1978-79. Lake Placid was abuzz with preparations for the 1980 Winter Olympics, and I was still working on establishing a career in the outdoors. I’d spent two seasons ...

If you’ve read this column frequently enough, you know that my parents raised Newfoundland dogs. My mother got her first Newfoundland when she was 12, and a newfie survived the car accident that took her life 60 years later. Many dog stories were generated during that time period, but one ...

I got a relatively late start to big game hunting. In 1972, I graduated from college, moved to Saranac Lake, and Tom Cantwell, family patriarch, suggested — no, more like demanded — I get my hunting license. Dutifully, I went to the Fish & Game Club, got my hunter safety certificate, ...

“Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.” — John F. Kennedy Everyone plays a leadership role at one time or another. Don’t think you don’t. We do it in numerous ways. If you’re a parent, a boss, a teacher, a coach or do anything to help a group get something ...

I had three wonderful uncles. There was my Uncle Rad who was a de facto father when I visited my cousins, which I did nearly every summer growing up. There was my Uncle Gus, a creative engineer with several patents to his name and a funny vocabulary to match. He always told us about his latest ...