Venturino has died after a longish health decline. You may know him as a long time writer for the newstand slickrags. He started out as a expert in “Old West” type guns before more recently selling them all off and declaring himself an expert in WW2 stuff.
I have several stories about Mike. My Dad and a lot of locals knew “Duke” (he gave himself that nickname BTW. No one here called him that) before he moved off to the west. Mike was from a town over in WV not even a mile from me across the border. You could also call it my de facto ” home town” since It is so close to me even if its in another inferior state.
. He was known by a lot of the guys who are my parent’s generation. Deer camp was always a time when some one brought him up I often heard about him in the 80s in stories. The men telling the stories having no idea he was a gun writer. Few people of my parents generation bought gun rags, they were too busy working in the coal mines. His local fame in the 1980s was from his reputation and antics before he left for the west. I could tell you some stories about Mike that I am sure never made it to the pages of Guns & Ammo. Maybe another time, I am already jumping over the line of good taste.
The blurb below says Mike claims relation to the Hatfield family. I have never heard that. And believe me this is a place where people with legit ties to the Hatfield or McCoys are well known. A lot of people here are related to them if even distantly. I’m not, but I was around and shot with Devil Anse’s great grandson several times in the late 1990s. He was a very close friend of Brady’s before he passed away. Coleman Hatfield was his name.
Even though I considered his writing about his early years in WV as full of shit as a pet racoon, that’s ok. Some entertaining fellas are full of shit. In the end, Mike was a gun guy and he never hurt anyone or did anything publicly bad enough to reflect on the rest of us and he did have a large fan base who loved him and enjoyed his writing. He certainly reinvented himself after moving off and good for him. He lived the dream and was an obvious success at it. If only we could all be so lucky!
Rest In Peace, Mike and best to his family left behind. We are all diminished.
Mike “Duke” Venturino. Born to the lineage of West Virginia Hatfields (yes,the Hatfields of notable feuding fame), Mike’s desire to be an author specializing in firearms was established early, and cemented with a journalism degree from Marshall University (yes, of the movie fame).
Summer stints at Yellowstone National Park made him fall in love with the area, so he moved to Montana in 1977 and has since called 70 acres of land home with his wife (and ace photographer) Yvonne and assortment of dogs, cats, horses and one donkey. From his home on the range, over 2,000 articles and seven books have been published.
Scattered Shots 
Well shit. I used to read his stuff in American Handgunner way back in the day.
I can’t comment on him being a dick, but I did enjoy his writing. RIP.
LikeLike
LSWCHP, I watched Mike get his start in Shooting Times, I think, focusing on cast bullets. I couldn’t afford commercial jacketed bullets, so I got a used Lyman 358311 mold and that’s how it started. Mike’s articles sort of ‘made it OK’ to use lowly cast bullets in my K-38 (also used). Thanks, Mike. RIP Terry Morgan, Alfred, NY
LikeLike
I don’t think he was an asshole. He was just well known locally as being a guy who thought he knew everything and often did something that made himself look foolish as hell in front of people when trying to show off.
LikeLike
Lots of writers were/are dicks in their personal life when you get to the heart of the matter. Askins, Hemingway, Cormac McCarthy. Another is that enormous dick who writes, if you want to call it that, for Shooting Times magazine who once wrote that hunting dangerous game in Africa was more dangerous than being an infantryman in Viet Nam. Terry what’s-his-face, last name starts with a W. I cancelled my subscription for that little bit of dickishness, as if they gave a shit.
If there’s a gun rag out there worth spending money on, I’d sincerely like to know the name of it.
LikeLike
I don’t think he was a dick. Most everyone here who knew him considered him a attempted show off,. He was probably likeable enough once he got a few more years on him. HIs affectation as a cowboy and giving himself the nickname “Duke” is a good example of this kind of thing. I know the other writer you are talking about, A lot of those jackasses say some of the dumbest shit to make up for some lack of self confidence. As for Askins, He is the kind of hard ass prick I like.
LikeLike
Well maybe a dork then. That may have been reason he re-invented himself. Plenty of people have done the same. I’ll quibble with you a little about Askins, though. It’s one thing to be a hard-assed prick and probably an attribute during his Border Patrol days, but the man was a self-professed psychopath. That ain’t good. No offense intended about any of that.
LikeLike
I like that he was an honest admitted psychopath. He was what he was and was honest about it and took pride in it lol.
LikeLike
Certainly. It’s also worth remembering he was a combat veteran of WWII, making several invasions in Europe as well as Viet Nam, where he claimed to have shot a VC with 44 Magnum, possibly the first human kill attributable to the cartridge.
Here is a link to his Colt New Service revolver, heavily modified to suit his needs.
Speed Versus Accuracy | The Colt Revolver in the American West | Autry National Center (archive.org)
LikeLike
Yeah I have several of his books. Including his autobiography.
LikeLike
I don’t blame you for the ‘Nam remark by Terry. I would have canceled at that point as well. 2 Guys I went to High School with made the ultimate sacrifice there. I still get upset when I think about Carter pardoning the ones that ran to Canada to avoid the draft. I did enjoy reading Mike’s reloading articles in Guns Magazine. I reload many obsolete calibers that he would write about. I’m in my 70’s so I grew up in the 50s and 60s watching the Westerns. My Great Grandfather was a Marshal in Nebraska in the 1890s. My favorite magazine was “Guns of the Old West”, which just this year went under after the publisher Athlon sold out to a new publisher, who didn’t think there was enough demand for that mag. anymore. Now that our WWII Veteran Dads & Uncles have died, us Boomers are now thinning out decreasing the demand for that type of gun writing, I guess. Best Regards & sympathies to Yvonne Venturino.
LikeLike