THE TEAM
THE TEAM
Chief cook and bottle-washer for the Anglo American Shooting Society are Silvio Calabi, from the US, and Douglas Day, also a Yank but one who has lived in England for more than 40 years. Between them, they have decades of experience in organizing and managing shoots, and also in easing newcomers into the unique culture of driven shooting. As AASS ‘staff,’ they stay with members and guests from arrival to departure. In the field, they stand with the Guns, to maintain safety and also to help newcomers connect with fast, high-flying birds.
SILVIO CALABI
As a publisher, editor, journalist and author, Silvio has roamed the world on assignment for sporting magazines since the 1970s and has written extensively about fine guns and automobiles, shooting, hunting, fly-fishing, boating and sporting travel. He is a knight of the International Order of St. Hubertus and has led shooting trips across the UK, Italy, Spain and Southern Africa. Silvio lives on the coast of Maine and in the mountains of Colorado. With Ken Duglan’s unexpected passing in September 2025, he has taken the lead in AASS operations.
DOUGLAS DAY
American by birth and British by upbringing, Doug is a devotee of the countryside life, especially driven game shooting and angling (fly-fishing) for trout and salmon. Doug worked for Ford Motor Company, ran his own Information Technology firm and then launched Shots & Company, a purveyor of spirits in bespoke cartridge-shaped decanters. He lives near Newmarket, Suffolk, where he is a member of the prestigious Jockey Club Rooms and Honorary Commander (call sign ‘Shots’) of the US Air Force 48th Fighter Wing at RAF Lakenheath. Doug was recently admitted to London’s Worshipful Company of Gunmakers as well.
In memoriam
KEN DUGLAN
The Anglo American Shooting Society suffered a terrible loss when Ken passed away unexpectedly on September 19, 2025, but he will forever be a part of us; he was the foundation, the man who pulled the AASS together and then fueled not only its growth but also its remarkable camaraderie. Ken was a great friend—warm and generous, kind, thoughtful, inventive, lightning-quick, witty and a natural raconteur and entrepreneur.
Ken came up through the British gun trade, first as a young man at Atkin Grant & Lang when that firm was on Bury Street in London, and then later as the owner of that company, which he re-established at Broomhills, the shooting ground he created outside St. Albans, in Hertfordshire. After he retired from AG&L, Ken helped his daughter Sian and her husband, Carl Russell, set up Carl Russell Gunmakers & Clothing Company at nearby Hatfield House.
Circa 2000, Shooting Sportsman received an invitation from Atkin Grant & Lang, which was one of our advertisers, to attend the Game Fair with them that summer in Yorkshire. Ken’s invitation included a couple of nights at the home he’d just finished building at Broomhills. I was the magazine’s editor then, and naturally I accepted Ken’s offer.
We had a blast; Gunmakers’ Row at the Game Fair was a Mecca for people like us. The true value of that junket, though, turned out to be Ken himself, and our resultant friendship. When we met, I was putting together shooting trips on the side while Ken had the shooting at a Scottish estate called Corsewall, so after that Game Fair I began bringing people over there. Eventually we branched out to other estates all over the UK.
Each November I arrived on Ken’s doorstep and together we looked after our shooting teams. Over the years, and with considerable input and support from well-known Guns such as John Thalgott, the late Keith Freeman, Dave Sweeney, Larry Broderick, Rock Lawrence and others, this coalesced into the Anglo American Shooting Society. The AASS was never a business but rather a pleasure, one that has taken on a life of its own, and never was there a better partner to work with than Ken. We are all bereft. —Silvio Calabi
