It was Thanksgiving week and Glenn Parks, of Boring, Oregon, was making his seventh annual pilgrimage to Ohio in search of a trophy whitetail buck. Born and raised in the area just south and west of Dayton, he was returning yet again to try his luck on the elusive whitetails. Glenn would be hunting with his nephew Terry and other friends on a large lease in Southern Ohio. As luck would have it however, at the last minute he was refused access to the lease and would have to search out other suitable lands. In the turmoil of the days leading up to the season opener, options were slim. Saturday evening, Brad Williams, a friend of the family, offered Glenn the opportunity to hunt with him on a nearby farm. Brad allowed as Glenn should hunt from a stand jokingly called the “High Chair” (because it looked just like a baby’s high chair). The stand might be hard to locate in the dark, so to be safe Glenn and his brother decided to walk it out in the daylight.

Sunday afternoon Glenn and his brother Robert visited the farm, the older Robert remarked that as young boys, they had come to this very farm to ride horses. Their parents had divorced when Glenn was only 18 months old. Their mother had later come to live on this farm and when Glenn was seven, they had spent a week there with their mother. Now 60 years later, he was about to experience the greatest hunt of his lifetime.

Glenn had chosen to hunt with a Remington .50 cal In-line muzzleloader which had been purchased for him by his wife as a Christmas gift the previous year. The smokepole had been fitted with a red dot sight and was more than capable of taking down any whitetail. Sunday evening a few caps were fired and the rifle loaded with 2-50 grain pyrodex pellets followed by a grease-patched round ball. All that remained was to apply the cap when he was on stand the next morning.

He was to meet Brad at 6:30 and they would be in their stands fifteen minutes later. Glenn dropped Brad at one end of the wooded area and drove the few hundred yards to the other end. Dawn comes late in Western Ohio, so both men were settled in and ready as first light came around. Before climbing into the stand, Glen had placed a few cotton balls saturated with doe urine around the tree. He pulled his grunt call from his pocket and was ready.

At first light Glenn raised the grunt tube and gave a few soft grunts. Nothing moved in the still morning air. After several minutes he tried the grunt tube again, all was quiet. His own breath started to fog his glasses, so he removed and wiped them off. Just as he was turning to lay them down, he caught movement to the side and tuned to see a large doe coming through the woods straight at him. When she was behind a tree, he gave a couple of short grunts. The doe stopped where she stood and at the same time he saw a fairly large buck moving across the woods at an angle to him. As whitetails are known to do, this one stopped just behind a brushy cedar tree with only its head and top of the back showing. Raising the in-line to his shoulder, Glenn debated the shot in his mind. It appeared to be a good sized buck and he wanted to take the shot, but the cedar caused him to hesitate. He pondered the moment, when very deliberately, the big buck took three steps into the open. In an instant the red dot settled on the buck’s shoulder and the smoke-pole barked. A huge billowing cloud of white smoke filled the air in front of the rifle and in the few seconds it took to clear, the buck was gone.

Glenn sat in contemplation, had he missed? It didn’t seem possible, but where had the buck gone? He never saw it after the shot. With the whole scenario running through his mind, he reloaded the in-line, just in case. Suddenly, a small six point came into view in almost the same place. There really was no thought of another shot, he was sure he hit the first, and did not want to risk shooting two bucks. Sitting quietly, he watched as the smaller buck finally walked off.

It was time to get down and investigate, the suspense was too much. He paced off the distance to the point of the shot, 40 yds. and decided that he had surely hit the buck in the shoulder. Searching all about the spot, he could find no blood. Still, he was convinced he had taken a good shot. He decided a circular search for blood was in order, so he began at ten yards. A fifty yard semi-circle yielded nothing, and he moved out to twenty yards and began again in the other direction... Still no blood, could he really have missed? The rifle had fired true the day before. It had not been dropped, or bumped, nothing of the sort. One more circle was in order so he reversed direction once again. Thirty yards later he walked right up on the fallen monarch.

Having never taken a whitetail before, he did not realize the enormity of the rack (after all, in Oregon, he had been harvesting large mulies and elk for years). It was however a large and heavy deer, so he returned to the tree stand to retrieve his gear and his camera for photos. After taking a few photos, he tried to drag the deer towards the truck, but soon gave up on that. Deciding to get the truck and go for help, he left a note on the tree stand for Brad should he come by. As he was heading for the truck, Brad came walking in. He had heard the shot and knew from the distinct sound it had to be Glenn. The two returned to the downed buck and Brad was astonished at the size. He declared it to be the largest buck he had ever seen in the wild.

The two began to drag it towards an area accessible to their truck, however the dragging proved difficult. and frequent rests were required. They finally achieved the edge of the wood and Glenn brought in the truck. Loading was another tuff chore as the big buck didn’t want to co-operate.

They transported the deer to the check station at Buckeye Pheasant Hunting Preserve in New Lebanon, Owned by his nephew, Terry. Terry’s sister Gail was checking deer and the local Wildlife Officer Trent Weaver was also on the scene. Both were struck by the size of the deer and the tremendous rack it sported. Trent remarked he was sure it would score in the 170’s. The buck weighed in field-dressed at just under 250 pounds. The buck was judged to be six and a half years old. It carried five typical points and two stickers on each side for a total of fourteen. The deer also sported a very deep scar across the top of its nose, possibly the result of a battle for breeding rights. Surely this fellow left behind some tremendous offspring for future hunters.

The buck scores 179 6/8 in the Buckmasters Typical Category for Blackpowder weapons. (B&C score 184 1/8) At the annual Deer & Turkey Expo in Columbus, Ohio in the spring of 2000, Glenn was awarded two trophies: Best of Show, Typical Antlers, Blackpowder and First Place 13 + point Typical Antlers for blackpowder.