Got this from another site that i go to everyday.
I found this in the DNT I applaud them for making the right decision.
For 37 years, Ray Rizzi and Santo Antonutti had been applying unsuccessfully for a Minnesota moose license.
This was almost their year.
On May 21, the 69-year-old Antonutti, of Esko, got a letter from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources saying he’d been drawn for the hunt in the state’s lottery. He called his 80-year-old friend, but Rizzi, of Duluth, said he hadn’t received notification yet.
The next day, May 22, Rizzi joined some friends at a fishing camp near Orr.
“He died Friday night at the dinner table,” Antonutti said. “His license came Saturday morning.”
Antonutti and Rizzi grew up in Gary-New Duluth. They had worked together for a time at the U.S. Steel Plant in Morgan Park. Their fathers had immigrated to America from the same region of Italy.
Understandably, Antonutti gets a little emotional when he talks about his old friend.
“Rizzi had so much enthusiasm for the outdoors,” Antonutti said, sitting on his porch Thursday morning. “He was a tough old buzzard. Best brook trout fisherman I’ve ever seen. … It was like we became brothers.”
When his moose hunting partner died, Antonutti had to decide what to do. He still wanted to hunt moose, but he has stents in his heart and is a Type 2 diabetic. He would need another partner, he told Lou Cornicelli, big-game program coordinator for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.
Antonutti told Cornicelli he would like to hunt with his and Rizzi’s longtime friend Ray Rybos, 79, of Gary-New Duluth. Rybos had not applied for a moose permit this year.
After weighing the decision for about a week, the DNR granted Antonutti’s request and notified him of the decision Thursday. Rybos’ moose permit is in the mail, Cornicelli said. The decision to issue the permit was made by Dave Schad, director of the DNR’s Division of Fish and Wildlife, Cornicelli said.
“We got authority to do this, and it’s the right decision to make,” Cornicelli said. “It’s a reasonable request given an extraordinary set of circumstances.”
Rybos is pleased to be able to take Rizzi’s place in the hunt. He and Rizzi had hunted deer together going back to the 1950s.
“It’s something else,” Rybos said. “We hunted all them years together. It’s a good feeling, you know? I never thought it would go through like that.”
About 2,700 parties apply for a Minnesota moose license each year, and only about 225 parties are chosen. This fall’s hunt opens Oct. 3 and continues through Oct. 18.
After Rizzi’s death, Antonutti had to decide whether he should make the hunt that he and Rizzi had planned for so long.
“I know if it had happened the other way around, Rizzi would have wanted to go,” Antonutti said. “That makes me feel better.”
Subject: This is just cool 
Fri Jun 12, 2009 5:32 pm
