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PARMACHEENE BELLE By: Norm Hyams Published in the October 2001 Taut Line I’m not going to get maudlin about this, but I was going through my tee shirts the other day and I came upon the one that says, “Old Fishermen Never Die-- Their Rods Just Go Limp.” There’s another one that has the same format but says, “They Just Smell That Way.” I looked at the face on the shirt and then at my own in the mirror, “ where did they get that kid” I mused. Yeah, I’ve been at this game a long, long time. I remember my first trout taken on a fly. It was early during WW II. I was just a teenager and my mother, brother, sister and I went for a week at Taconic State Park which is on the border of New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts. The stream running through this park is called the Bash Bish. My rod was a Horriks-Ibbotson bamboo, for nothing else was yet invented, and my reel was some Bakelite plastic concoction inasmuch as all metal was going for the war effort. My brother, being a complete pragmatist (later a lawyer and that explains his actions) was fishing with pickled minnows which came in a jar. I had purchased some flies and kept them in what I thought was a proper fly box but later I found out to be a worm holder that was fixed to the belt. I found a spot in the river where the water was cascading over boulders producing white frothy pockets that I thought should hold trout. I made, what passed for a cast, into the froth. Instantly my rod started shaking as if it was hit by electricity. I struck back and removed a lovely trout from his protected environment. I scooped up my prize and started scrambling up the boulders in which the Bash Bish was nestled. In doing so I cracked my Bakelite reel on a rock with predictable results. That was the end of my fishing on that trip. I ran back to the cabin and placed my prize in the bath tub for I did not want to harm this magnificent creature. My brother, who was faring badly on his picked minnows, asked to borrow my box of flies. Feeling some sense of superiority, and realizing that I no longer had a functioning reel, I agreed to let him use my “fly box.” I checked on my fish (it died) and then went to check on my brother. I found him in the river bending at the belt to disentangle his fly from some obstruction. As he bent over, the top of the “fly box” opened, and all my flies were drifting down the river. Thus began my love/hate fishing relationship with my brother. The fly on this occasion was a Paramacheene Belle I had purchased at the General Store in town. If I remember correctly, this was some sixty years ago, it was tied on a snelled hook. The fly is an old classic brook trout fly probably derived from the style of tying that dominated the 19th century. From the standpoint of being my favorite fly it rates very highly because it was my first fly. I should like to share this pattern with you at the October meeting.
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