Hi,
I saw this link on the NH fly fishing site and had to share. How cool to have a fly tying course in college. Certainly not in my day. in the last century! I haven’t seen reference to it here, so I posted it.
Mike
http://flyfishing.tamu.edu/index.html
That’s great. The first one in the country was taught by George Harvey of Pennsylvania about 60 years ago at Penn State University in State College, PA.
I took fly tying at Oregon Institute of Technology in the late '70s and early '80s. It was a PE credit. Tuition money well spent.
There were fly casting and fly fishing classes as well.
This link explains someof the history at PSU.
http://www.joehumphreysflyfishing.com/harvey.htm
Make sure you click on the old pictures of George Harvey and his tying classes from way back. Interesting!
A lot better course than some of the crap I was forced to take.
Dave
I think this was a first in our area.
I was talking with Ian and he was explaining components of the course to me. It was interesting in the fact that he weeded out very quickly the students that thought this was going to be an easy course sitting on the bank of the stream watching the world go by. It was quite intense, but also garnered a lot of a interest from the serious students.http://www.fanshawec.ca/news-events/fanshawe-fly-fishing-course-first-canada
Great. Ian Collin James–I watched his fly fishing show. I really liked him and the show.
I was fortunate to have taken Mr. Harvey’s course while a student at Penn State in the early '60’s. If I remember correctly the course was non-credit, 10 weeks long, given only in the Spring quarter, Saturday mornings for about 3 hours and limited to about 12 students. It focused mainly on tying techniques, rather than on specific patterns and gave me a great tying base to work from. I believe that he started the course in late 1930’s.
That Texas A&M course was locally famous and well done. I invited the intructor, Professor Jackman, to speak at our local TU meeting and he did a great one hour introduction to entomology for fly tyers. He said his college tying course was done primarily to give his entomology students some valuable practical skills. Unfortunately, ProfessorJackman died unexpectedly several years ago and the course is no longer taught.
The late JC and I taught a 13 week class at a local college in mid-Michigan in 1972/3. Included casting, insects, and fly tying…I believe we were the first to use TV cameras to film the casting so folks could see what their mistakes were and how to fix them. It was VERY well received.
As a Texas A & M Alumni, I have to ask…Is it time to start with the Aggie Jokes?
Me and some other Aggies went fly fishing once. We took my old pick-up truck. Unfortunately, we spun out on a dirt road and the truck went over the embankment, into the water. The front seat passenger made it out OK, as did I, but the guys in the back almost drowned because they had trouble getting the tailgate down…