From The Workbench

Earlier this summer Junior and I managed to carve out a week to head up to Nova Scotia for some summer salmon fishing. We usually go in the fall (I just got back from that trip – more on that later) so this was a bit of an experiment, and while the trip as a...

Great early steelhead fishing footage on the Stamp River, courtesy of the Canadian Government Motion Picture Bureau… (hat tip: Moldy Chum)

I learned of Harry Lemire’s recent passage (as many of you probably have as well) to a land, hopefully, of even better Steelhead fishing than this one. Although I knew that an end was imminent, it was still a shock as I had received a hand tied steelhead fly by Harry only a few months ago.

Yesterday I headed into Boston to attend an auction of baseball great Ted Williams’ personal effects at Fenway Park. My chief objective was to re-acquire a 6 1/2’#3 Spring Creek Special rod which I made to be presented to Williams by fellow Hall of Famer Tony Gwynn as part of a tribute he was arranging...

I posted a photo of this rod over on our facebook page recently, and got a few questions about it (it’s a 7’6″ Spring Creek Salmon Rod for an #8). This rod was a special one for me to make, since I built it as a college graduation present for Junior some years back.

You’ll have to forgive a little shameless self-promotion, but I hope it’s a little less shameless since the man who wrote the piece – Jeff Joiner — has been a friend and customer for many years now. Anyway, his son has started a publication and so Jeff penned an article for a recent issue.

A Classic from Lee Wulff: (hat tip: Moldy Chum)

So, I hinted a few weeks back that Junior and I had something fun in the works, and here it finally is! It all started because I needed to make some reel seat acorn caps for a rod and so Junior thought it would be fun to bring his camera into the shop and try...

Well I finally got back from Danbury earlier this evening and managed to unpack my things and eat a little dinner before getting ready to turn in. I was even too tired to manage a fly or two at the bench! Danbury, of course, was the site of this year’s Art of the Angler show...

Well the milling machine upgrade is finally working, so I thought I’d post a few photos of it in action. It’s a Hardinge TM-UM that I thought would be great for doing reel seats so I bought it and have been monkeying around with it for the last few weeks trying to get it ready…

About the only thing that wasn’t fantastic about this ad was that the rod should have been bamboo! Bells Whiskey from Condor Cape on Vimeo.  

To truly make it they say you must suffer for your art, though in the case of most rodmakers I know whatever indignities we’ve incurred have typically been of the financial rather than physical variety. There are occasional exceptions to this but on the whole most of us manage to ply our craft more or less...