​Paul Williams: If all that you knew about Paul Williams was how the man decorated for Christmas, that might be enough. Williams, every year, would set up a display in his front and backyard that rivaled anything I’ve ever seen on television, in movies or in person. The sheer number of lights, moving parts, and work that went into the enormous arrangement was downright incredible. Williams was a high-pressure steam boiler operator for a company that he wished to remain anonymous for many years. After warning his employers time and again that the operations were increasingly dangerous, he saw no changes in procedure, largely because the cost of said changes would be prohibitive. The anxiety of dealing with what he described as a ticking time bomb became too much, and he retired to start a new life and career, making indestructible soft-plastic baits and working at Bass Pro Shops. The baits he constructed were ingenious.
 
He searched for and tested materials far and wide before settling on a fabric that he would bake into soft plastics so that said fabric could hold a hook without tearing, like the soft plastic bait itself. The fabric he found was the material used to make veils for wedding gowns. He toyed with procedure and details in his home oven for months before building a soft-plastic bait with an interwoven mesh that in essence would not tear off the hook, or at least not tear very easily. His attention to detail and determination were incredible, but that wasn’t the most amazing part about Williams. No matter the customer at Bass Pro, no matter how tired we were, how busy it was, or the nature of the question or concern, Williams took as long as was needed to make sure everyone he encountered was ready to fish with confidence and joy. He taught kids knots, he rigged up rods, he took soft-plastic baits out of bags and hooks out of packaging to show different rigs to new anglers. He’d come out on the floor after unloading a 1,000-piece Christmas-apparel-laden truck and help a pre-teen angler untangle line on a newly-purchased pushbutton reel.
 
When you came into the store, he treated you like a friend asking for a hand, no matter who you were, where you were from or what you needed. It was that spirit of kindness and patience that was even more impressive to witness day in and day out than even the most incredible of Christmas-light displays that he put together every year. Williams was forced to retire when a condition that affected his lungs made physical work impossible. I learned, after a text in which he asked me to pray for him, that he had passed in his sleep from the condition. I remember his kindness, joy and light every day and make every attempt to infuse my interactions with customers with the joy, and the light, he brought into the world.

Roy Bilby: If a complete novice told me they had only one day to learn everything they could about bass fishing, and asked me who to spend that day with, I'd put them in touch with Roy Bilby. Bilby was originally our store pro here at the Utica Bass Pro Shops, but he's added stores to his repertoire, and now works out of Auburn and Connecticut as well. I have been enormously fortunate to have fished with a number of anglers all over the country, but I've never met anyone with the attention to detail, knowledge of a species, and ability to predict, down to the most minute detail, what is likely to happen next on the water. Consider this: I fished with Bilby on his home creek and we combined for 70-plus smallmouth bass. I forget the exact number I caught, but it was south of twenty. Now, consider for a second that a 17-bass day on a creek pretty respectable, unless the guy you are fishing with CATCHES FIFTY. The discrepancy just highlights how attuned to this species Bilby is, how careful he is with preparation and presentation, and how very, very rarely he makes mistakes. On that day, and in general, his ability to avoid the common mistakes most of us make [he sharpens hooks while on the water, only one great example] is the absolute difference-maker for a lot of fish that most of us will never even know we had a chance at. 

​Mark Usyk: To describe Mark Usyk solely as a talented fishing writer would be selling the man short on several fronts. Although he is a gifted storyteller, that’s a small slice of the ways in which he brings creative insight, beauty and laughter into the lives of anglers fortunate enough to be familiar with his work. His books have titles like “Carp are Jerks,” and “Not All Trout are Geniuses,” and they’re a reflection of the humor and perspective with which he looks at the sport. Rather than a lecture about the finer points of fly-fishing, his books read like a collection of hilarious stories a friend is telling you about mishaps, blunders, amazing moments and good people on the water. Perhaps the most impressive and endearing thing about Usyk’s writing is his honesty, he talks candidly about the difficult of grinding away at a thankless job, about the hardship of divorce, and he recognizes and appreciates the redeeming moments we find when we pay attention. As writers, an honesty that connects us with our readers is the highest ideal we can aspire to, and Usyk achieves it in his work again and again.

​Ryan Lorensen: The Most striking thing about Lorensen, once you get to know him, is just how much time he spends with clients on the water. This is a guy who, while working a full-time job in a Syracuse hospital, will still run two daily trips throughout salmon season on the state’s fabled Salmon River. When you consider the amount of work and preparation it takes to run a single daily trip in inclement weather, then double that, then add a full-time job on top of that, it’s hard to fathom how this guy has the energy. He’ll describe to you the process of setting up rods for clients days in advance to be ready when he barely has time to sleep, but that doesn’t make it any easier envisioning doing it yourself. Top it off by adding that the guy guides not only float trips down the Salmon, but boat trips on a variety of New York lakes, and ice-fishing trips all winter, and all you’ll keep thinking after you spend an afternoon with him on the water is: “I could really be more efficient with my own time…”

​John Pitarresi: I’d always known John Pitarresi as the local sportswriter in the greater Utica/Rome area of Upstate New York when I was growing up there as a young man. You’d see Pitarresi’s column, read his take on the local games, and learn from his experience and insight with every copy of the Observer Dispatch. His Outdoors column was always a witty reflection on a species of fish, a great angler, a season or time of year or just the sport in general. His writing had humor and wit, history and perspective and it shared valuable insight on some of our favorite pastimes. I would later learn that Pitarresi volunteered more than twice a month at the local food pantry housed in a church less than a mile away from his house. Every other Saturday John would be in the church parking lot, directing traffic, making jokes, talking highlights from the prior night’s game, and just bringing a sentiment of warmth and patience and joy to what was likely an otherwise unenjoyable experience for several patrons who had to wait an hour or more for food that they badly needed and couldn’t afford. Knowing what to feed a fish in a given season to get it to eat is an admirable quality in an angler, but feeding human beings, with both food and compassion and friendship, with your personal time and energy is even more impressive.

​Mike Huynh: Huynh is the Director of Campus Ministry for the entire S.U.N.Y. education program, which is an admirable and daunting task in of itself. He functions in a variety of capacities that include conducting and overseeing retreats for confirmation candidates at various parishes throughout the diocese. Inspiring faith in young adults during one of the most difficult and crucial points in their lives is a tall order, and one Huynh tackles with optimism and spirit on a regular basis. His knowledge of and passion for chasing steelhead and salmon in Western New York rivers is equally impressive and he has chased and caught these fish in all manner of weather in one of the most unforgiving climates in the Northeast. But it is the fish he has helped others catch that he is most excited to talk about. He has books in his office that are collections of photos of students and colleagues with their first steelhead. Hunyh has been part of the Catholic worker movement, where he has helped build homes in impoverished communities, and he currently serves as the advisor to the Fishing Club that he helped to create at S.U.N.Y. Oswego. Young men and women anglers could hardly hope for a better beacon of light to guide a future life on the water, and off it.

​J.R. Cooper:
Cooper, the grandson of guides who catered to gangsters during the Great Depression, remembers his first few fish coming on a cane pole with worms. When he first began ice fishing, without the financial means to invest in something as luxurious as a shanty, he simply dragged a cardboard refrigerator box onto the ice. He would go on to build a guide service than employed 18 different guides. His cardboard-box days are behind him, as he’s landed pike to 51 inches, muskie as long as 56 inches, and has won more than 60 tournaments. He and his wife Cindy run a school every winter to teach young anglers how to ice fish. He’s removed errant hooks from both legs, his ears, the nose and the crotch, he explains with a laugh. He’s suffered a chipped tailbone on one dramatic run into the tournament podium. He politely excused himself from the post-tournament interview by saying: “Okay, I have to go to the hospital now.”
                     “It will give you respect for God, for the unbelievable nature that is out there,” Coop says of his years spent on the water. “I’ve talked to psychiatrists and psychologists,” he says. “And a day on the water is incredible for your health and mental stability,” he says. His Coop’s Classic Fishing Tournament has raised money for cancer research, he routinely helps anglers with illness or disability get on the water, and the ideology resonates when you speak with him.
                     “In this business, there are a lot of people who tell you what they’ve done but I want to give back as much knowledge as I can. I want to help those next in line so they don’t struggle,” he says.

​You realize just how much you were looking forward to the next book by John Gierach when you suddenly realize that there will not be a next book by John Gierach.
           At first, when you hear of the passing of a someone like Gierach, you are saddened, as you might expect, but you figure it will be a fleeting, passing emotion that you experience like a thought or sad memory that stings and fades as you go about your day. It’s only when it keeps coming back to you that you realize that you’re part of a community that has truly lost something special.
           It’s hard, initially, to pinpoint why it is that the death of someone you had never met or spoken with might have any impact on you whatsoever. It seems strange that your life might be impacted at all by the life of someone who’d you’d likely never share a room with.
           It’s only when you start to probe the emotion with a why that you truly get at what you’re thinking. There’s something truly remarkable about fishing writers, and especially writers like Gierach. They are, in their books, blogs and essays, talking about a sport that we ourselves have come to love. So, there’s that commonality and shared interest, sure. But in Gierach’s case, he’s talking about it in a way that’s humble, genuine, affectionate, and sincere. He’s not bragging about fish or exploits or abilities, he’s simply discussing a sport he loves and the people he’s been lucky to share it with.
           He’s polished and refined those words more than perhaps he’d admit, and certainly more than it might seem when we read his seemingly casual, conversational tone. He’s polished them in such a way that they paint a picture of a determined but flawed, kind, but at-times grumpy, folksy, observant, whimsical small-town fly fisherman.
           John Gierach never claimed to be, or attempted to seem, tremendously talented at the sport, intelligent, courageous or extremely driven. Stubborn, maybe, and set in his ways, but he never claimed or bragged about anything that would pass for intelligence, courage or creativity. It’s very likely that he was all of these things, but he never made any attempt to portray himself as such.
           So, you had a humble, kind, flawed but sincere fisherman who loved the sport and kept at it with his small group of friends despite hardship, mishaps, and difficulties, and yet…
              Everyone seemed to love him.
           Mention John Gierach in a fly shop, you’ll get the knowing nods. Post a photo of a book of his on social media and you’ll likely get comments and responses. Lend a book of his to a friend that fishes and hasn’t read him, and you’ll likely get a thank you at the very least, and probably a funny conversation or two discussing the most memorable chapters.
          Gierach, despite describing himself as an average angler, despite admitting his shortcomings, and despite laughing at his own mishaps, endeared himself to a generation of reading anglers. In fact, that’s precisely how he endeared himself to a generation of reading anglers.
           He took the elements of the sport that so many of us struggle with but are reluctant to talk about, and he poured out his uncertainty, confusion and exasperation on the page. In a world where many anglers are trying to seem like they’ve got all the answers and secrets, Gierach was quick to admit that he, like most of us, was guessing and hoping.
           And what humility and sincerity do, in truth, is they give us license to be ourselves more candidly. Because if a relatively famous fishing author is saying that, “the technical voodoo behind the best bamboo rods remains a mystery to me, as it should,” and he is still cherished and beloved by the fishing community, then maybe we can admit that we don’t understand ‘technical voodoo....” either.
And if a beloved fishing author isn’t always successful in his endeavors, if he gets frustrated, skunked, and can write sentences like: “I was stalking a rising trout, stepped on a rock I didn’t expect to be loose, and went down, bashing my shoulder hard enough to get an X-ray to look for bone chips….” Then maybe we can admit that we don’t always find the fish, that we miscalculate, approximate and sometimes even stumble and fall, and we can maintain some hope of being appreciated, respected and even loved despite our failures or shortcomings.
           Because here’s Gierach, talking about all his mistakes, miscalculations, missed fish and misunderstandings and yet… somehow… he’s almost universally beloved. In fact, it almost seems like that’s why he’s beloved.
           We have a sport where so many ‘experts,’ are trying to tell you the exact size, color and species of insect that fish will be eating at an exact place and an exact time on a given day in a certain season, and that amount of knowledge is, let’s face it, downright intimidating to most of us.
           Because the vast majority of us spend forty or more hours a week making a living, and then another twenty-five or so helping family and friends, catching up on chores and housework, and walking the dog and mowing the lawn. If we spend fifty-six getting much-needed rest and seven eating dinners, seven commuting, ten watching television or browsing the internet, seven in the shower and brushing our teeth, four shopping, and twenty hours pursuing any other hobby, sport or interest that we might have, that leaves only four hours per week to gain knowhow, technical prowess, experience and wisdom as it relates to the water.
           If we accept for the sake of argument that it does take 10,000 hours of work, practice and attention to detail to master a given craft, it’d take us 2,500 weeks, or forty-eight years, to become an expert angler. Now of course that’s provided you live in a climate, or have a disposition, that allows you to fish December through March of every given year, which for most of us in the United States, is not a given.
           The math speaks for itself and it doesn’t lie, while there are a lot of us anglers who love the water and the sport, there are very few master craftsmen when it comes to any type of fishing: Most of us just don’t have the time.
           So, it stands to reason that someone claiming near-perfect wisdom, technical expertise, and years of amassed knowledge, while they might be interesting to listen to for a little while, at the end of the day wouldn’t be very relatable or endearing.
           When we have to shoehorn this undeniable truth into our understanding of the sport and the way we share it with others, then we’re forced to acknowledge that maybe it’s not a technical prowess, wizardry, incredible understanding of the fish or the water or even a long list of accolades or exploits over the years in our angling experiences that will gain us acceptance and acclaim in our social circles or at our Trout Unlimited meetings.
           After all, who among us can say with any certainty what fish will be doing at such and such a time on a certain day in a given month?
           Someone relying on, say, Dumb Luck and the Kindness of Strangers, however, that’s a lot more relatable. In Gierach’s books and collections, more than twenty all told, he never promises any unforgettable exploits, unbelievable stories, descriptions of far-off, remote destinations, or bizarre fish stories.
           Rather, he takes an almost formulaic, predictable route to sharing his story. You could, if you’d read enough of them, probably guess that a Gierach story was one of his simply by reading the first few sentences without even seeing an author name attached to it. Bill Heavey and John Merwin were similar in that regard among contemporary fishing writers, their style was recognizable of its own accord.
           Gierach’s gift is that he holds an unforgiving mirror up to his own experience, examines the sport in all its eccentricities with all of its color and beauty and its varied personalities and character, and he laughs aloud without mocking our pastime, because he’s laughing at himself. He’s laughing at how crazy it is to spend hours and hours, and thousands of dollars, to swindle fish into eating something manmade only so that we might hold them for a brief instant and photograph before sending them back from whence they came.
           The sport, examined purely objectively only on what it yields for the practitioner, is somewhat ridiculous when we think about it. We as a species breed another species to put it in bodies of water where they wouldn’t be otherwise. We do this so that we can visit it with fake bugs that we place in front of them on long thin lines, only to rip them away from their home, hold them and send them back. After we’ve pulled said species that we placed in the water, which we’ve protected and maintained with thousands of dollars of manmade infrastructure and machinery, and we’ve placed it back, we proceed to argue with one another about whether said specimen was handled correctly and carefully enough so that – after it was bred in human captivity, released into a man-maintained and regulated waterbody, having been stung with a hook and ripped from its home, it might return to said waterbody to await a repeat experience from the next angler to pass through. Hopefully, the traumatic experience won’t be so jarring that it discourages the fish from eating actual insects in the interim, because of course we’d prefer it grew as much as possible prior to its next cameo appearance in the human experience.
           Fishing, as we practice it now, is an absurd activity on several levels that could not possibly make more sense given the current state of humanity.
           As a species, thanks to climate-controlled living spaces, goods produced on an enormous scale for minimal cost, endless digital entertainment and currency we mostly just hold temporarily as it passes between the outstretched hands of enormous corporations, we have never been more removed from our true nature.
           Human beings were created to hunt, gather, and travel, sharing our experiences, joys and increased understanding along the journey.
           Increasingly in modern society we are herded like sheep between jobs where we earn a wage, and places of entertainment where we can be relieved of said wage. There’s social media and cable television to keep us tame and occupied in the other hours, and very few, very rich individuals control the vast majority of the resources. We watch televised debates and pick sides in a political sporting match to feel as though our opinion matters or determines our society’s direction.
           And in reality, it’s this repetitive, predictable and stale treadmill that is truly contrived and insincere.
           On a river, stream or beach, you might be targeting a fish that has been stocked by human hands only to release it again, but you’re treading on rocks that have been there for centuries, surrounded by trees that have grown and changed, adapted and found the light for decades of rain-soaked springs and frozen winters. You are immersed in something genuine and authentic, in the exact way you were meant to be [save for the gear, rod, waders and polarized optics, of course]. In exploring and searching, moving and learning, adapting and adjusting, you are using the most natural and sincere sensibilities that you have as a human.
           Maybe a sense of humor, a willingness to be self-deprecating on occasion, just to remind our friends that we don’t take ourselves that seriously, a sincere appreciation of the resources that fishing brings us into contact with, and a genuine desire to learn and improve, to travel and explore and to truly feel all the beauty that is almost inherently intertwined in every fishing life will be the most fitting way we can remember Gierach.
           Gierach’s life and words were constant reminders that in order to be respected and admired, enjoyed and praised, all we really need to do is be as altruistic as we can be on a daily basis, sincere, and patient with our fellow anglers.
           And that sounds a hell of a lot easier than catching a 23-inch wild brown on a miniscule fly that you matched the hatch with while executing perfect casts from the bank right in front of a hidden hole that no other angler could find.
           Whether we like it or not, or admit it or not, at least some of our angling is done to impress our fellow fishermen.
           What Gierach showed us is that if it’s approval we’re after, there’s a much shorter and easier road to take to that end, and it starts right here. All we really need to do is try to understand the sport, the fish and the geography, and to share that journey in a sincere and humble way.
The fact that we as a society have become so focused on measurable achievement, goals, competitions and comparisons and most-recently, shareable exploits or accomplishments, that we need to devise an entire ‘sport,’ to justify returning to the exact places and environments that we were created to exist in, is irony at its finest.
           And not only did John Gierach understand this irony inherently, he embraced it, loved it, laughed at it, and made it clear enough to us so that we could share in the joke with him.
           “Back when we still camped on the water, we’d now and then have a fresh brown trout dinner, but there’s no way to fry them in the motel room, so we release the trout and live on burgers and fries, as fishermen do.”
           It’s subtle observations like that one that fill Gierach’s books and make you laugh and think and wonder all at once.
           In All the Time in the World, Gierach writes, when talking about fishing stories in particular: We’ve all seen sentiment outlast reality.
           And such will be the case with his words and stories, which will live for as long as the language, I’m sure.
           “… I was thinking about rivers,” Gierach writes in All The Time in the World. “How they’re as mortal as we are, but in geologic time, sot that in our limited way of seeing things, they seem to last forever, perpetually recycling the world’s water from snowpack to oceans and back again – the same water we’ve always had or ever will have.”
           Gierach’s words will appear in collections, reprints, on T-shirts and bumper stickers, they’ll be shared, quoted, paraphrased, and summoned when wisdom and humor are needed simultaneously.
           When a river dries up, certainly we don’t say that it’s gone, and we’ll give John the same respect, looking forward to the way his insightful soul will manifest itself in our lives as anglers, farther on downstream.