Gary Lewis (born in 1967) is an outdoor writer, author and TV host residing in Bend, Oregon.
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Lewis was raised in southwest Washington (Kalama and Vancouver) before moving to the outskirts of Oregon City at the age of 19. At the age of 20, Lewis married his wife, Merrilee. The couple lived in the Willamette Valley till 1994. Lewis and his wife, Merrilee, currently reside in Central Oregon with their three camo-clad daughters.
He began his outdoor writing career in 1995 with a story published in American Bowhunter. In 1996, The Bend Bulletin newspaper began to publish his column. His first book (Sun Publishing’s Hunting Oregon) was published in 1999.
In 2009, Lewis, in cooperation with producer Brad Douglas, began a TV show called Gary Lewis’s High Desert Outdoorsman, which aired on affiliate stations in Oregon, northern California, Idaho, Alaska and Wyoming.
In 2010, Lewis re-branded his TV Show to "Gary Lewis’s Adventure Journal" which is currently under production (Jan. 2010).
Lewis has written, or contributed to, 12 books. He has hosted three DVDs.
Lewis has hunted and fished in six countries and across the United States. An international hunter, one of his favorite destinations is Africa. Here is a quote from a story he wrote for ESPN. "As the sun rose, the ground sparkled with golden mica and quartz. Dry river canyons cut through the hills, and game trails led in and out of the brush. Unlike the Kalahari, which I had glimpsed from the airplane, here the vegetation was thick. Almost every bush and tree had thorns.
"In the early light, gemsbok, hartebeest and kudu were easily spotted by the reflection of sunlight on horn. We stopped to glass on top of one hill, and a troop of baboons took off running along the road below us."
He is a past President of the Northwest Outdoor Writers Association(NOWA).
Lewis is also Associate Producer for Scott Linden Outdoors radio, heard on 150 stations around the country.
Lewis is a columnist for The Bend Bulletin, a Contributing Editor for Successful Hunter magazine and a humor columnist for Bear Hunting magazine and a regular contributor for many other magazines and newspapers.
Contributions;
2010- Lewis was presented with NOWA’s prestigious Enos Bradner Award. "Enos Bradner's book on steelhead fishing was the first outdoor book I ever read," says Lewis. "The Enos Bradner Award is meaningful to me because his writing inspired me to become a steelhead fisherman, which in turn animated a love for the outdoors."[1]
Five of his books have won NOWA’s Excellence in Craft awards and he has received numerous awards for his newspaper columns and magazine articles.
Lewis, through his association with other outdoor writers, met long-time writer Ed Park, a frequent contributor to Outdoor Life, Field and Stream, Sports Afield and other publications. Lewis and Park were good friends from 1999 through 2008, when Ed Park passed away. Lewis counts Ed Park, Bob Nosler and John Nosler (Founder of Nosler; An ammunition and hand-loading manufacturer) his mentors.