Elgin T Gates (7 November 1922 – 16 November 1988) was an American hunter, adventurer, author, and firearms and ammunition technician who was born in

Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho t ...

and died in

Idaho Falls, Idaho Idaho Falls is the fourth most populous city in Idaho and the county seat of Bonneville County. It is the state's most populous city outside the Boise metropolitan area. As of the 2020 census, the population of Idaho Falls was 64,818.2020 Cen ...

. He was responsible for proposing and testing the

super magnum A super magnum is a longer and/or more powerful version of a "Magnum cartridge, magnum" Cartridge (firearms), cartridge. Although the term "super magnum" typically refers to a Handgun, handgun cartridge, created by lengthening an existing straigh ...

cartridge family in the 1970s in collaboration with Dan Wesson, which led to many

wildcat The wildcat is a species complex comprising two small wild cat species: the European wildcat (''Felis silvestris'') and the African wildcat (''F. lybica''). The European wildcat inhabits forests in Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus, while th ...

designs, as well a few production cartridges such as the .357 Remington Maximum. Gates was a central person in the development of handgun metallic silhouette shooting,American Rifleman , The Super Mags
/ref> and served as president of the International Handgun Metallic Silhouette Association."Lunching with legends: a reminiscence"
''Gun Magazine'', March 1, 2007. During his leadership of IHMSA, Elgin published a newsletter titled ''The Silhouette'' where amongst others

John Taffin John August Taffin (May 2, 1939 – March 10, 2025) was an American author from Boise, Idaho who wrote several columns for gun magazines including ''Guns'', '' Gun Digest'', ''Sixgunner'', ''Shoot!'', and '' American Handgunner''. A math teacher ...

contributed. Before Gates died in 1988, his impressive big game trophy room was destroyed by fire.

References

American hunters 1988 deaths Writers from Wyoming 1933 births {{US-writer-stub