Hey Mike,
Thanks for the call, and the offer of the magazine. My Gawd, we are almost neighbors! Will enjoy meeting you in person at the Danbury show.
I gave Ralph a call last night and, just kidding him, said," I was just talking on the phone with the guy who taught you how to tie." He said, "No you didn't, he's dead." Then I said it's the fellow who got you the buzzard wings." He said "He never sent them.I'm still waiting for them!" LOL.

The funniest part of all this is that we only live, what, maybe 15 or 20 miles apart, and yet have never met. As you can tell, I do a lot of chatting with folks.
Just a month ago or so, a group of us were up on the Ausable and staying at one of the fellow's cabin in the "Acres." Fishing wasn't too good so I did a lot of checking out the river all the way down to the forks. Ran into 7 fisherman along the way and just by chance happen to know them all. None of them had had so much as a look. When I got to the Forks I parked in back of the Grand Union and walked down to the confluence with the East Branch to see if anything was going on. I watched a guy hook, and then lose, a nice fish on a white streamer.
When I got back to the cabin I told the guys of the fellow who had had a bit of luck on long feathers, and that he was the only one who had any action of all the guys I had met all the way down the river. I mentioned the names of the others I had run into, as they knew a couple of them too. Then Brandt asked which one got the hit on the streamer and I said "Don't know. It was hard to talk with him as he was out in the fast water and I was on shore."
Well, the main subject around the dinner table that night was not about the trout or hatches or lack of both, but of the fact that Mead had finally met someone on a river he did not know!
I look forward to reading your article. Winnie would be proud to know that the little boy who used to hang around and watch her and Walt tie,who loved to fish the Catskills and who often stayed at their home, has now honored her memory with, from what I have heard, is a very well written piece of Dette history. I, for one, thank you for doing this. Bob