Relevant Biographies

September, 2005

 

M.L. (Mic) McPherson

Born in Wyoming and raised in Western Colorado, Mic has been interested in guns and the collective shooting sports since childhood. He began handloading at fourteen.

 

After a tour of duty in the Air Force (toward the end of the Vietnam era) he entered college where he studied Engineering Geology, first at Mesa State College and then at Texas A&M University. Having learned that he enjoyed and excelled at writing term papers, he became interested in professional writing.

 

With encouragement from Bob Bell (Handloader's Digest), Bob Hodgdon (Hodgdon Powder Company), Norm Nelson (noted hunting author), and others, Mic began submitting articles on handloading in 1987. Since then, he has turned his love for handloading and shooting into a full-time job. He has edited two editions of Cartridges of the World, has written several manuals on handloading and keeps quite busy with submissions to Rifle Shooter, Precision Shooting, The Accurate Rifle, American Rifleman, Guns and Varmint Hunter magazines.

 

Mic took up varminting at about age eight and has enjoyed the sport ever since. The Grand Valley of Colorado (west of Grand Junction) then provided prime prairie vermin opportunities and, as a teenager, in that pursuit Mic wore out several rifle barrels. Equally, he has enjoyed deer and elk hunting.

 

Other hobbies include prospecting, which led to his co-discovery of the Lost Adams Diggings, which led to his appearance on Unsolved Mysteries in what became the all-time most successful episode of that television series. This discovery also led to the novel, Zigzag Canyon, which he co-authored with friend Ron Feldman. The Zane Grey Society honored this historical novel by presenting the authors with their prestigious Book of the Year award.

 

Most recently, Mic has participated in the only Treasure Trove Dig ever conducted in the Superstition Wilderness. Interested readers should refer to the Internet site: Dutchhunter.com

 

 

Byrom Smalley (who prefers the moniker, By)

By retired after 43 years in the rocket business as Senior Principal Engineer in solid rocket motor design at Thiokol Corporation. This is a field with definite relationships to cartridge design. While there, his titles included Staff Scientist. He was responsible for carrying preliminary designs through prototype development to successful test program completion.

 

As a hobbyist, By participated in design of several World-Record-Holding model airplane engines. He specializing in exhaust systems, lubricants and fuels. He designed and optimized an engine and exhaust system based open theory originating in the late 1800s. He thereby helped design a 0.049 cubic inch, 2-Cycle engine with world-beating size- and weight-to-horsepower ratios. This engine propelled a model airplane to 120 mph!

 

Through this work and his rocket motor development, By has secured six patents (not counting two SMc patents that he and McPherson co-hold, with others pending) and has others in the works.

 

By is a serious varminter and big game hunter. He has collected many record book trophies from several continents. He has taken many animals with handloads in his own wildcat designs and with rifles he has built. He owns rifles chambered for various Ackley Improved cartridges and two built on the 375 Smalley, which is essentially an Ackley Improved 348 Winchester, necked up to 375. This number easily launches 300-grain Barnes X bullets at 2850 fps. His 375 Smalley Chambered, P-14 Enfield, has collected two world-class trophies, Eland and Bison.