Page 27 - Safari Trails

2018 Fallen Soldiers - Youth Turkey Hunt – Will
Russell

Dear Oklahoma Station SCI and ODWC, 2017 Essay Contest Junior Winner - Eva Aycock

Thank you so much for your generosity and the opportunities you provide our youth through the Creative Writing
Competition. This past weekend was the culmination of events offered to my daughter, Eva Aycock, as a contest
awardee. In addition to being published in each respective organization’s newsletter and magazine, honored at the
annual Oklahoma Station SCI Banquet, provided a membership to SCI, and being sponsored for a week at the Outdoor
Texas Camps, she finally made a cold and very wet hunt on the Circle P Pogue Ranch near Stringtown. She now has a
nice ram that we will have finished as a European mount and memories of those experiences that will last a lifetime.
I’ve attached a picture from the hunt.

I would also be remiss if I did not thank Eva’s teacher and essay contest school sponsor, Coach Blair, at Owasso’s 8th
Grade. There is a special and powerful place that teachers and coaches have in the lives of our children, and we are
lucky to have him.

As Eva’s father, her essay was my reward. But beyond that, I hope that other dads and mentors will find encouragement
from her essay and see the potential impact we can have in the lives of our kids. These kids, by the way, are our next
hunters, conservationists, parents, teachers, and decision makers. So it’s our responsibility to train them in what’s right.

Now coming full-circle, this weekend we’ll head back to that same tree stand in Tillman County where her essay began
and continue the story. I hope you will continue your story too.

Spencer Aycock
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