Beginnings and Crowning Achievements BOONE AND CROCKETT CLUB FISCAL YEAR 2014 Annual Report A band of bighorns on the Cadomin Mine, Alberta, Canada Photograph courtesy of L. Victor Clark, B&C Official Measurer1 BOARD OF DIRECTORS Founded In 1887 By Theodore Roosevelt Boone and Crockett Club Boone and Crockett Club President – William A. Demmer Foundation Secretary – Tom L. Lewis President – B.B. Hollingsworth, Jr. Treasurer – Marshall J. Collins, Jr. Secretary – Tom L. Lewis Executive Vice President of Administration – Treasurer – C. Martin Wood III Timothy C. Brady Vice President – James J. Shinners Executive Vice President of Conservation – Vice President – John A. Tomke Morrison Stevens, Sr. Class of 2014 – Remo R. Pizzagalli, Vice President of Administration – Edward B. Rasmuson, James J. Shinners, James F. Arnold John A. Tomke, and Leonard J. Vallender Vice President of Big Game Records – Class of 2015 – Gary W. Dietrich, Eldon L. “Buck” Buckner B.B. Hollingsworth, Jr., Ned S. Holmes, Vice President of Conservation – Tom L. Lewis, and Paul M. Zelisko Stephen P. Mealey Class of 2016 – John P. Evans, Steve J. Hageman, Vice President of Communications – R. Terrell McCombs, Earl L. Sherron, Jr., Marc C. Mondavi C. Martin Woods Foundation President – B.B. Hollingsworth, Jr. Class of 2014 – James Cummins Class of 2015 – CJ Buck Class of 2016 – Ned S. Holmes COMMITTEES SPECIAL COMMITTEES CONSERVATION COMMITTEES Audit – Edward B. Rasmuson VP STEPHEN P. MEALEY AWCP – Jeffrey S. Crane Conservation – James L. Cummins Compensation – William A. Demmer Conservation Education – William W. Taylor Corporate Governance – Ben B. Wallace Conservation Grants – Deborah Donner and Conservation Policy – Stephen P. Mealey and Robert Evelyn H. Merrill Model Multiple Use/Sharing – Melissa Simpson and Convention and Meeting – Manuel J. Chee M. Timothy Wigley Membership – Andrew L. Hoxsey National Conservation Leadership Institute – Nominating – Ben B. Wallace John A. Tomke Sagamore Hill – Ben B. Wallace North American Model/Conservation Funding – Simon C. Roosevelt ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEES Stewardship – Thomas D. Price VP JAMES F. ARNOLD TRM Ranch – Fred C. Hirschy Budget and Finance – Marshall J. Collins, Jr. Wildlife Health – Rebecca A. Humphries History – Leonard H. Wurman Library – H. Norden van Horne RECORDS COMMITTEES Physical Assets – Earl L. Sherron, Jr. VP ELDON L. “BUCK” BUCKNER Strategic Planning – James L. Cummins Records of North American Big Game – Richard T. Hale COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEES Hunter Ethics – Daniel A. Pedrotti, Jr. VP MARC C. MONDAVI Communications – CJ Buck Associates Program – John P. Schreiner Boone and Crockett Club Media Response – Mary Webster Foundation committees Outreach – Anthony J. Caligiuri Development – James J. Shinners Content Management – AC Smid Investment – Paul Zelisko Publications – Mark B. Steffen Gift Acceptance – B.B. Hollingsworth, Jr. National Collection – Robert H. Hanson 2 MISSION STATEMENT It is the mission of the Boone and Crockett Club to promote the conservation and management of wildlife, especially big game, and its habitat, to preserve and encourage hunting and to maintain the highest ethical standards of fair chase and sportsmanship in North America. 3 MESSAGE FROM THE BOONE AND CROCKETT CLUB PRESIDENT he Boone and Crockett Club finishes of Wildlife Mississippi, will evolve into a leader- Tits 127th year filled with energy and ship position of the Club’s Conservation Policy enthusiasm for its continuing mission to Committee over the next several years. Cummins promote the conservation and manage- and fellow B&C member Steve Mealey agreed to ment of wildlife and to encourage ethical assemble and regularly publish a conservation policy newsletter to feature our policy successes fair chase hunting. B&C’s strategic and and enlighten B&C supporters on key issues re- operational plans have been designed to garding our conservation mission. The newslet- meet the challenges of an evolving world. ter is also intended as another deliverable to our Our successes with conservation policy ef- Trailblazers in Conservation sponsors illustrating William A. Demmer forts, quality membership attraction, B&C how B&C is working on their behalf. B&C President University Programs, our financial future, Andrew Hoxsey and his Membership Com- Lansing, Michigan our Foundation’s successes and our Club mittee have kept the pipeline of potential mem- messaging efforts clearly demonstrate that bership candidates full. Hoxsey and his team are our planning efforts are on track and bear- to be commended for attracting such high-caliber ing fruit. new members and pipeline candidates. An en- gaged membership is the secret to success of any Our Conservation Policy team, led by Rob- organization, and the Boone and Crockett Club is ert Model, hosted a meeting for all interested no exception. The future of B&C relies on mem- B&C members and leadership at Model’s Moon- bers who give of their passion, their time and trea- crest Ranch in Cody, Wyoming, this past May. sure to protect and enhance this thing that we call The focus of the meeting was twofold; one was hunter-conservation. to communicate to the membership the accom- A year ago in June, the Club leadership met plishments of the policy team in an open dialog in Branson, Missouri, at member John L. Morris’ that would create a greater understanding of the Big Cedar Lodge. The focus of the leadership was work of the committee and to inspire greater fu- B&C branding, committee metrics and staff met- ture participation in policy work by our members. rics as they relate to committee output. The met- The meeting also began to lay the plans for Policy rics that were created were both quantitative and Committee leadership succession and for gradual qualitative. The metrics tied directly to B&C’s Club assumption of the costs associated with our implementation plan. B&C had been challenged policy activities. financially since the recession onset in 2008. Strategically, Boone and Crockett Club Costs had been pared to balance budgets but it conservation policy efforts were the number one was then time to begin to create additional rev- focus of our recent strategic and implementation enues to support our refined mission. B&C oper- plans. Greg Schildwachter facilitated the meeting ating committees took up the challenges to meet and explained to the attendees that the circle of their metric expectations and generated two years influence associated with conservation policy in of financial operating success. I am confident in Washington, D.C., is quite small. Schildwachter the follow-on leadership that more financial suc- told us that our Club’s team—led by Model—in- cess will follow. As our branding effort continues cludes Schildwachter, as well as David Anderson’s to grow and more hunter-conservationists join Natural Resources Results, the Congressional our cause either through becoming associates, Sportsmen’s Foundation, and the Wildlife Man- advertisers, Trailblazers, brand licensees or B&C agement Institute is as influential as any conser- Foundation supporter, the Club’s financial abil- vation policy consortium in D.C. B&C member ity to impact our mission will grow dramatically. James Cummins, currently the executive director With that growing financial power, it will be the 4 responsibility of future management teams to use 2013. They are already planning for the 29th tri- that money wisely and keep it focused on where it ennial celebration to be held in 2016 in Spring- can best impact our historical mission. field, Missouri. The Records Division held a The strategic and implementation plans on five-day course for new Official Measurers. My which B&C members James Cummins and Jayar wife Linda and I attended with a group of 15 Daily worked so hard continue to positively im- other students and were well challenged by the pact our mission work. The many interviews Dean of North American Measurers, Director afforded the membership resulted in plan pri- Jack Reneau and his most able partner, Assistant orities focused on conservation policy, university Director Justin Spring. All attendees not only endowed professors and programs, conservation walked away as new Official Boone and Crock- grants that impact the B&C mission, big game re- ett Measurers, but we received a dynamic educa- cords, promotion of the North American Model tion in the history of North American wildlife of Wildlife Conservation and the promotion of conservation and the predominant role that the the B&C brand. The success of the B&C Founda- Boone and Crockett Club has played in creating tion team, led by Ben Hollingsworth, will afford and securing its future. the Club future financial resources that can make B&C’s University Programs continue to be a powerful impact on our mission. It will be the a priority within our strategic initiatives. B&C responsibility of B&C’s leadership and board of currently has endowed programs at University of directors to prioritize our activities and focus on Montana, Oregon State University, Texas A&M, those efforts that are core to our mission. Texas A&M Kingsville, Michigan State Univer- B&C’s Communications Division is at the sity and the University of Wisconsin–Stevens heart of much of what the Club is about. The Point. New programs are in development at the branding efforts that were presented and discussed State University of New York (SUNY) and at at the Branson retreat are at the heart of the new Mississippi State University. Michigan State re- evolving B&C website. Promoting our historic role cently expanded its program to include the Boone in hunter-conservation and inspiring community and Crockett Quantitative Wildlife Center. The engagement is at the heart of those efforts. B&C’s Boone and Crockett Endowed University Pro- Associates Program continues to grow as does the grams were designed to develop and inspire a respect for and impact of our heralded magazine, cadre of wildlife professionals for our future. The . Recent readership surveys indicate very intent was to create professionals with a powerful favorableFair Chase reviews of the magazine’s balanced pre- grasp of science, policy and leadership.