34 NEBRASKAland • OCTOBER 2017
Jake started tagging along on hunts
when he was just a boy, walking
alongside his dad and uncles through
the fields. On opening day in 1956, he
joined the hunt for real, toting a
.410 single shot that one of his uncles
gave him. "I thought I was pretty hot
stuff, being only 8 years old," he said.
By the time he reached high school,
Jake and his family had moved to
Chicago. The distance begged for more
time than a weekend, so father and
son met with the high school principal
to ask if it would be ok to miss some
school for the hunt. "He thought it was
great and gave me the whole week
off," Jake said. "So we'd hunt with the
uncles on the weekend and during the
week dad and I would hunt."
Jake's grandparents on both
sides were part of those early
hunts: grandfathers in the field and
grandmothers in Scotia. Jake's uncles
started bringing their kids, some of
Schmidt, Jim Jacobsen, Sands and
John Dolton walk a hillside CRP field
near Scotia on opening day of the 2016
pheasant season.
