What started it all for me. While in college I discovered vertical fishing for crappie at the dam on Lake Proctor. After the first trip I was hooked. I watched and learned from the gentlemen that had many years experience. One man named Lee from Brownwood took me under his wing and taught me many things about jigging for crappie. Of course all I used was plastic. The was another gentleman named H.M. Chance from Cross Plains who was there regularly and he always caught fish but I noticed he was using something different, hand tied jigs! Lee and Mr. Chance we kind of rivals it seemed. I believe they competed with each other but never spoke to one another, least that’s the feeling I got from Lee. Myself wanting every advantage I could get I began buying jigs from Mr. Chance. After a couple of years and many $5 bills later I figured I could start tying for myself, so did what most do, went to basspro and got things to get started. After failing to get all necessary items and failed attempt at the vice, I put everything up in a box and left it there until the summer after my first year coaching. Had time on my hands and needed something to do. Got the box out and here we are 20 years later. Have not fished with a plastic since. This jig is one of Mr. Chances old ties, it is named after him because had I not come across him I highly doubt I would be doing this today. The head is his also. Both of these men made an impression on me that will last forever and hopefully one day I can pass that on to some other young man like they did me. Both the fishing and the tying experience.

Patrick Corcoran

A great beginning. Neat post.

That’s a neat story. Thanks for sharing it.

Great post thank you for sharing! I have already ordered a few jigs from your site & haven't gotten a chance to fish them yet, but they look fantastic.
Delivery was fast as well, 3-4 days from order to my doorstep, it's really nice to be able to get good quality hand ties without the long wait.
I noticed you all are adding more of them too, and am already planning another order because I see a few more that I just gotta have/try, keep up the great work sir!

I will say the same thing I did over at CDC.

Not to go too long, but a quick bit about my start. I was disabled due to back surgery in 1989, didn't even try fishing again for 4 years. After a few years my mother passed away and I got a little money from her. She had some in stocks so after a little while I got interested and did really well until 2000 when I had quintuple bypass surgery. This took all my enjoyment away, like just didn't want to. Had to force my self back to fishing, but the stock thing I lost the love I had for it and after a couple years of loosing I just closed my account and quit. Mind you I had been spending 10 to 12 hours a day on my computer that had two screens. Now I can not watch TV all day and with my back I can't fish all day every day, so somehow I decided to try tying a few treble hooks with feathers to go on a Pop-R. They looks like heck, lol! Anyway decided to give trying a try and bought a vise, but learning was not like no, we had no videos on YouTube, lol! Anyway it was harder, but I finally got there and had a lot of fun tying and talking about tying, helping others that wanted to learn. Anyway I started literally for something to do, lol!

Skip

Thank you Tin Boat, keep me updated on how you do. I add things as I can. Skip I have looked at your stuff for years. Really appreciate everything you do!

I've been inspired by several here, Skip and Pepop helped me tremendously getting started tying and with me doing YouTube vids I absolutely had to record what I adopted as my style of tying to help others get addicted......
Some have cursed me while others have thanked me......
Sound like a good start fridays86.......