 |
|
(Image above is at the
time of
One of George
Grant's |
George Grant is a man every fly tyer should know. Not because he's something special, but because, by his own admission, he's quite ordinary. What you see is a little, old, quiet man. Old because he was born in 1906 in Butte, Montana. Quiet because that's his nature. Small because that's the way Nature made him, and he's had to cope with it all his life. If he bought a medium sized shirt, he'd drown in it. But he's a role model we can all follow. George has taken some very ordinary circumstances and done some extraordinary things. With limited means, using just his skills and influence as a fly tyer, he has sold individual flies and mounted fly plates at Federation of Fly Fisher, Trout Unlimited and other similar group activities for a total of $75,000. He gave it all away. He has published two hard bound books: The Master Fly Weaver and Montana Trout Flies. They're significant because they preserve bits of history that could have been lost. The book on weaving hair-hackled trout flies is a classic. It shows (among many other things) in minute detail, the unique procedure of weaving badger hair on threads to form hair hackles. The book records and teaches skills that could have been lost forever. The Montana Trout Flies book showcases a number of the developers of fly patterns that originated in Montana. George is probably one of a only a dozen or so men who could have created this book. None of the others stepped forward, so George did it.
|
