If you're older than a tot, say greater than 50 years of age, then you no doubt remember the 1980's. The 1980's, where I spent my high school years, was such a cultural and technological phenomenon of creativity, innovation, and change. One of those things that arrived was MTV which changed the world of music. Some might say it wasn't all for the better. Akin to that, but years later, was when streaming came to light. What they did is is make access to music more accessible. You no longer just had the radio and the record shops to keep you up with the latest tunes from your favorite artists. Streaming brought a shift in the revenue stream from consumer to artist, and third party platforms benefitted greatly from that, like billions of dollars greatly. Left out was the originators, the creators, as everyone had a hand in it, and received a piece of the pie.
Ironically, the first video on MTV was by a band named The Buggles. Their song, "Video Killed the Radio Star" was a smash hit, pretty much a one and done for that band. But in that song, ironically, was a underlying message that technological change had affected what was once something we thought as creativity, and gospel if you will, on how music is created, distributed and enjoyed.
Last week I kinda voiced my opinion on fly fishing shows, okay, The Fly Fishing Show, and how it maybe had, "Jumped the Shark". Times change, things change, people change. We see that in fishing. Fish change. Migrations change. Bait changes. Environmental conditions change. And in the sport of fly tying and fishing we see major changes as well, the innovators, who enjoyed the virginality of the sport and locations where the sport originated, get older, pass away, or move on.
There are names, let's stick to saltwater for now, and I am sure I will miss several, who we are greatly familiar with and appreciative of as the innovators and originators. Apte, Kreh, Popovics, Pallot, Huff, Tabory, Wejebe, Gartside, Brooks, and Clouser. They had a clean canvas coupled with brilliant minds to explore all that is fly tying and fly fishing. They did it without digital imagery, like they used film cameras, without cell phones, no apps, no computers, no social media- Facebook, Instagram, and You Tube, and with only a few media outlets, magazines, local newspaper outdoor columns, and a few early television shows. That is where the legends were made and their hard work and dedication is seen as it has touched every corner of the sport we love and enjoy.
When we look at the "greatest" of everything, I think we tend to have a short memory, or, we weren't even privy to have seen the impact of any one person, because, we weren't even alive at that time. I first met Lefty Kreh in the early 1990's, when he was in his 70's, far after he had done his most innovative work and was active in the sport. Yes, he did the shows, his casting demos were always three deep at the pond, he fished, but I'm talking like in his early days when he fished with the likes, of Huff, Apte, Pallot, Popovics, and Clouser. When people talk of the "greatest", like say basketball and football, people get all kinds of up in arms because of the difference in opinion, and their experience, with said stars because it varies from person to person and generation to generation. Are the guys above the best ever?
There were legends, there were stars, and there were players. It's the same in fly fishing. There are legends, there are some "stars", and then the rest are anglers, like (the) average anglers. It's okay to be average. Most of us are, in most aspects of our lives. Middles class, or average, is what we strive for. But the problem with us, and in these times, is we try to live and become something we are not. It didn't happen back in the day. People worked hard. People lived within their means. If they couldn't pay cash, they went without. No mortgage, they rented. Car payment, no thank you, a used car will do. But, as we got away here in America of who and what we were, solid blue collar workers, we morphed into "keeping up with the Jones's", which is part of the damage of the fabric of our existence today.
Let's just say we say that fly fishing in saltwater really started in 1970. It started way before that I know, an example would be Stu Apte, who started this back in the 1940's. But's let say January 1, 1970 was go day. Popovic's was just getting going with his fly tying. Lefty, who had been at it since the late 1940's and had already developed the Deceiver, was in full swing in both tying, fishing and writing.
From the 1970's to the 2000's many things happened in fly fishing and fly tying, especially in the northeast salty waters. Magazines popped up, both national and local, VHS recorders were invented, Pallot, Wejebe, and Sosin started making television shows, Dixon discovered Montauk, a moratorium hit the striped bass, and some movie A River Runs Through It was released. In the mix the internet was born bringing with it websites and the dreaded fishing forums. Throw in cell phones as well, although they haven't changed the sport much, right?
People couldn't wait for books to be published. People couldn't wait until that local outdoor column or the fishing report in that back of a local magazine would publish a "local" fishing report (above), albeit sometimes over a week old. You didn't care. It was great reading. It was believable. It had credibility. And mostly, it wasn't controlled by a conglomerate of big business or advertisers who intertwined commercials and advertising and social and political influences in with their products. Advertising, sure, no worries, we get it, but what has it become?
I can remember in the 1990's when I started attending The Fly Fishing Show. You could liken it to a place where all of your childhood heroes would make an appearance. Imagine that same place, in a convention hall, where a Shaq, a Jeter, or a Brady walked around freely or bellied up to the bar and you had, most likely, a chance to talk or even sit with them? That's how it was. And it wasn't just the all-stars we ogled over. The guides, the lodge owners, the pictures, all raised them from being "normal" people, like us, to fish God's who not only slayed all of the beasts we read about but also did it in all corners of the world.
Now they were were global heroes. And yes, heroes, because most of these guys served their country on one capacity or another. And there were also local heroes. Guys and gals who were dialed into a certain fish or fishery that was more of an interest to local anglers than across the country or the pond. These folks were a big draw. They were good for the sport, good for us, and in the end did well for themselves. They were the stream you could ride in order for you to get from point A to point B, like catch fish or not catch fish. If you listened you did well, or better, if you fished with them then the percentages went even higher.
But what is interesting, and alarming, is that over the years I have seen men and women raised up on pedestals to the heights of those that originated all of this. Now that's not all bad. Some might belong in that group. A young kid might put Big Papi on the same stage as Ruth, Mantle, Williams (a fly fisherman), and Aaron. That is his experience during his time with the sport. I see it in fly fishing as well. I remember when local guys like Jasper, Warshawer, and Strolis would pack a place so tight you couldn't breathe, and the amount of hits and comments in the forums could have caused a computer to crash. They come in, great idea or innovation or just a fresh look or idea, saturate the shows, meetings, and print and video markets, and then it, and them, goes away. That is partly due to our new need of things always being new, and instant, including both in fly tying and fishing.
I have met Blane Chocklett. Super nice guy. If I was in a line up he wouldn't be able to single me out. He's a guide from Virginia. He has developed many of the hottest flies and fly tying things out there now, one of which is called The Game Changer. It's an articulated fly tied on a series of hook and shanks. They are
Well that's where we are at. Who is going to be that hero, earned or appointed, that is going to save fly fishing from itself. In a world of internet and print media falling over each other to interview and have the same guests on their podcasts. There are only so many heroes, so many fish, so many many spots, and only so much content is has become like listening, over and over and over, to a band that has only put out one album. You are left just waiting and waiting for something new. In fly fishing it's the same person with the same story just seen or read about in different formats. Who is going to save the local chapters meeting? Who is going to save the fly fishing shows? Can the next hero please step forward?
