and on a path to be the company’s first female CEO. She had proven to herself and everyone else that she could be successful on her own. No one would doubt her ability to serve as president of the family’s vast petroleum and real estate empire. The two childhood sweethearts were finally back in big-sky country.
The wedding of Tim Thornton’s only daughter could have been a lavish affair, the formal joining of two families who were some of Montana’s largest and wealthiest landowners. Instead they opted for more subdued nuptials at Raife’s uncle’s hunting operation in Niassa Game Reserve, Mozambique.
When the newlyweds returned from a three-week honeymoon that took them across South Africa from Cape Town to a private game reserve in the Sabi Sands, Raife went to work building the next chapter in his life. Both the Hastings and Thornton families had been leasing their land to hunting outfitters for years, and some had been more dedicated than others when it came to managing the natural resources. Raife built a plan that would sustainably manage the ranches’ wildlife while providing a path forward for his fellow special operations veterans.
He consolidated all of the leases into a single outfitting business that handled everything from the booking of the clients to the processing and shipping of the meat. There were a surprising number of closet hunters among his associates in the world of New York finance and, thanks to his time spent on Wall Street, he rapidly built a steady stream of clients. Word spread quickly that Raife delivered a high-quality outdoor experience, and he soon had a waiting list.
A hunting operation is only as good as its guides and that was an area where Raife was able to differentiate himself from the rest of the industry. He hired the best outdoorsmen he had served with in the military, including several of the instructors from Kodiak. They were hardworking, competent, reliable, and fun to be around; the clients loved them, and they delivered. The guides received a steady stream of income while finding time to take a breath and evaluate their priorities outside the world of special operations. Raife’s goal was to connect successful businessmen, entrepreneurs, and financiers with hardened operators. This created an informal network that became known as Warrior/Guardians. Those in the private sector connected to a community of talent that was unprecedented in modern society and that was often shrouded in secrecy. Both groups recognized the value in bridging the divide between those who did the fighting and those who paid for it, and more than a few internships, businesses, foundations, and fresh starts were born under the Montana skies. When the operation began hosting wounded veterans on hunts as part of a foundation funded by successful clients, the guides found even greater purpose. Bonding under the stars, these men and women, many of whom had been grievously injured by IEDs, began healing the emotional wounds of war.
The business was doing well and was financially viable, but Raife and his guide team quickly realized that they had a problem on their hands: many of their clients, successful individuals who led busy lives, couldn’t shoot very well. Wounding animals was unacceptable so, in typical Hastings fashion, Raife made a plan. He hired retiring instructors from the SEAL sniper school in Indiana to design and implement a hunter training program on one of Thorn’s properties outside Missoula. He made attendance a prerequisite for booking a hunt and client performance improved drastically. Once word got out, the school took on a life of its own and was soon making more money than the outfitting business. Ironically, government contracts with special operations units provided the school’s most reliable clients.
The final piece fell into place when Raife was personally guiding a client who had drawn a once-in-a-lifetime Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep tag in the Missouri Breaks. After a tough stalk, the client’s expensive custom rifle went “click” when it should have gone “bang,” and the old ram that they’d been tracking for days gave them the slip. Working in the dark by headlamp back in camp that night, Raife diagnosed the problem. His discriminating eye noted several issues, all of which came as a shock to the client. The hunter asked Raife if he’d be willing to build him a dependable rifle and the former SEAL’s career as a custom gun maker was born.
Reece pulled his Land Cruiser in front of the structure that served as the gun making shop and parked next