by Karen Mehall Phillips - Thursday, February 8, 2024
Above: NRA WLF Co-Chair Jane Brown, left, and 2021 Diana Award winner Brittany Longoria, right, present the 2024 SCI Diana Award to Siri Campbell-Fossel of Colorado.
Recognizing excellence in international big-game hunting and wildlife conservation, Safari Club International (SCI) presented SCI member Siri Campbell-Fossel with its 2024 SCI Diana Award at the SCI Convention banquet in Nashville on Feb. 3. Sponsored by the NRA Women’s Leadership Forum (WLF), the honor is named for Diana, the Roman mythology goddess of the hunt. It is presented to women who lead the way in the hunting arena and who demonstrate exemplary ethics afield and work to promote wildlife conservation and public education regarding hunters and hunting.
Enroute to achieving the Diana Award, presented by NRA WLF founding member, co-chair and competitive sporting clays champion Jane Brown and 2021 SCI Diana Award recipient Brittany Longoria, Campbell-Fossel hunted 100 game species on six continents. This week she is on her way to Pakistan for another big-game hunting adventure. In recounting her hunts through the years, she says she is most proud of taking what is commonly referred to as the “Dangerous 7,” which includes the “big five” dangerous game species and the hippopotamus and crocodile.
Born and raised in the Midwest, Campbell-Fossel credits her love for the outdoors to growing up on a farm. She earned a master’s degree from Loyola University and then lived in Monaco for 20 years. She spent her career in communications, working as a teaching radio reporter, writer and event planner. In 2008, she moved to Montana and in 2010 married her husband, Jon, who shared his passion with her for hunting and wildlife conservation. Today they live in Colorado where they are members of SCI’s Four Corners Chapter. She currently serves as vice president of the SCI Foundation (SCIF) Sables, dedicated to promoting our outdoor heritage through support of wildlife and conservation education programs, and on the SCIF Advisory Board. As with all other Diana Award winners, she was selected by past award recipients.
When it comes to Campbell-Fossel’s journey as a hunter-conservationist, she says that SCI has given her “a deep appreciation for the role hunting plays in wildlife conservation.” More than ever, we need hunters in our ranks who can talk with nonhunters about hunting and articulate hunting’s benefits to wildlife and their habitats. We also need forums where women hunters can come together and share their hunting stories, which is why SCI was pleased to hold its second consecutive Women Go Hunting reception during the show, a gathering inspired by 2017 Diana Award recipient Denise Welker.
While it is rewarding to receive an award and to be recognized by one’s peers, we hunters do not hunt for the recognition. Being acknowledged for enjoying our all-American lifestyle is never expected, but it is important as we work to shed light on why we hunt and educate the public on hunting’s role in wildlife conservation to enhance its cultural acceptance. In standing with groups like the NRA and SCI, it is in our nature to show our appreciation for hunter-conservationists who inspire us and give back, to recognize excellence in all legal, regulated hunting pursuits, and to strive to emulate those who attain it.
Diana’s Enduring Influence: From the Roman Empire to the Present
As with the bronze Diana Award statue presented to every SCI Diana Award winner, the goddess Diana is typically depicted wearing a short dress or draping cloth and holding her bow and quiver of arrows alongside either a hunting hound or a deer. She appears in several Roman myths. The one I recall from my elementary school mythology lesson is the story of huntsman Actaeon, written about by the Roman poet Ovid in 8 CE. When Actaeon, who revered Diana, came upon her bathing in the woods and stared with potentially dishonorable intentions, she punished him by turning him into a deer. He became the prey and was hunted down by his own hunting hounds.
As with hunters today, Diana remained part of popular culture during the Renaissance, the period that bridged the Middle Ages and modern history from the 14th to the 17th centuries. She is honored every year during the three-day festival known as Nemoralia, or the Festival of Torches, so called because worshippers assemble by candlelight and leave behind tokens of devotion at the Sanctuary of Diana at Lake Nemi, 15 miles outside Rome. Originally celebrated by the ancient Romans on the Ides of August (Aug. 13-15), the festival soon spread to other parts of the Roman Empire.
The appreciation of Diana, the goddess of the hunt, continues in modern times. Today she remains known as one who fights ferociously for what is right and draws on her tenacity and determination—hallmarks of every SCI Diana Award recipient to date.
About the NRA Women’s Leadership Forum: Uniting women of influence, the NRA Women’s Leadership Forum is a philanthropic society dedicated to protecting and defending our Second Amendment and the freedoms it ensures. As the presenting sponsor of the SCI Diana Award, it applauds the contributions of distinguished women in hunting and wildlife conservation. For more information, visit NRAWLF.org.