Another in the Fishing Personalities Series
A Life Well Lived: Polly Rosborough and The Casual Dress
Wherein we come to know the man, himself
In the annals of fly fishing lore, many personalities loom both large, and notable.
On the other hand, there are significant people only dimly remembered as we copy-and-paste our way to knowledge.
Among this latter group is possibly one of the greatest, mostly unknown luminaries in the field..., Ernest Herbert, "Polly," Rosborough.
Ernest "Polly" Rosborough
While a man of modest means, appearance and demeanor, Polly Rosborough accomplished much and set the sport on a path that still runs firm today.
Leaving Home for The West
Ernest "Polly" Rosborough was born in Mammoth Springs, Arkansas, in 1902. He grew up, like most people in that area, fishing for warm-water species like bass and catfish.
But he left his Arkansas home in 1919 and made his way towards the western mountains, working his way around the harvests and logging camps of the American and Canadian West.
One of his trips through northern California in the early 1920's found Rosborough fishing in the mountain streams, and this started his lifelong interest in cold rivers and trout.
In 1928, at age 24, he moved to Klamath Falls, Oregon, in the southwestern part of the state. Shortly thereafter, he settled into his lifelong home in nearby Chiloquin, on the banks of the Williamson River.
Here he went to work as a lumber mill operator, and traveled throughout the region at this occupation. As happens to most and many men, this line of work would provide him a livelihood for most of his working life.
Ernest acquired his nickname, "Polly," from coworkers, early on, while working at a box factory in Northern California. It seems he was a garrulous sort, and talked an awful lot -- "Polly the Parrot," became his sobriquet, and it stuck.
He later said he came to like it, as it was a good name, and was good for business.
The War and The River Man
But it was one river that Polly was to become forever tied to - Oregon's Williamson River.
This stretch of water joins the Sprague River just south of Chiloquin and winds its way to Upper Klamath Lake. He was often heard to say that the Williamson was as good as any trout water, anywhere, and he came to know it like no other man. It was there that he began to study the fish and habitat of the river.
When World War II burst on the scene, Polly enlisted and served with honor as a gunnery instructor in the Army. At that time he was around 40, and one supposes he was a bit too old to fight in the active combat theaters. But he did his duty, nonetheless.
Upon his discharge from military service, he returned to Oregon and went back to his practical work in lumber mills around the region.
Meanwhile, he occupied his spare time by fishing, and more importantly, he kept studying the trout and its environment.
Polly became a well-schooled student of the aquatic insects that form the bulk of any trout's diet. Like prominent Eastern anglers such as Art Flick, or the Catskills' Harry Darbee, Rosborough developed into a bona-fide entomologist.
Rosborough didn't have a formal scientific education; he never finished high school and was a working man. However, that didn't hinder him. He lived in a time when a man was respected for what he did and for what he had learned, as much as for having a sheepskin on the wall. He knew all the insects in his home range, particularly the aquatic species, and could rattle off their scientific names on command.
His Writings
Eventually, Rosborough left the lumber mills to devote himself exclusively to angling, and fly-tying. In time, he became a frequent contributor on flies and fly-tying for magazines such as "Trout," "Fly Fisherman," and, "Salmon, Trout and Steelhead."
At a later point in his rather storied life, Polly earned money by both tying flies and fur trapping marten in the winter. At the ripe old age of 80, he published a how-to book on trapping, called, "Marten I have Known."
But it was another, earlier book that forever became synonymous with his name.
The Book
In 1965, Rosborough wrote, and self-published his first book, ''Tying and Fishing the Fuzzy Nymph.''
It was his seminal work, and is now regarded as a modern angling classic.
If longevity at the printing press is any indication of a book's worth, then ''Tying and Fishing the Fuzzy Nymph'' is a pot of gold - it is now in its fifth printing.
The book culminated his entire life-study of the aquatic insects upon which fish feed.
It introduced the tying and fishing of nymphs like mayfly, caddis, and dragonfly to a generation of anglers, and so debuted Rosborough's own versions of these, which he called, "Fuzzy Nymphs."
These flies were a contrast to previously known patterns, in that they were relatively simple, and tied from common materials. These were not "artsy" flies like many of the well-known wet patterns, nor were they exacting imitations of real insects. Rather, they were what we today call, "impressionistic patterns."
These "fuzzy nymphs" got the name becasue they were tied primarily from animal hair and fur, crucial elements in their design.
The Fly - The Casual Dress
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Original Pattern Casual Dress
Courtesy of Fly Fish Ohio
The "Casual Dress" is probably Polly's best known pattern. It symbolizes Polly's belief that the SIMULATION OF LIFE is the ultimate goal of any fly, since flies themselves are inherently lifeless things.
It is basically a hook, some small wads of muskrat or other fur, a little ostrich feather… and a lot of life. Rosborough said it was thrown together casually, one day, thus the name, "Casual Dress."
This is one of those flies that doesn't look like much; most would not call the fly "fishy" looking. It’s just a fuzzy, scruffy bunch of fur in a vaguely cylindrical shape. But its intent was not to look like anything in particular, but like many edible insect creatures in the water.
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Polly achieved his aim of simulation by using simple materials that possessed inherent movement of their own, instead of creating lifeless, precise duplicates of aquatic insects.
Rosborough himself is quoted as saying his intent for these was not to copy anything in particular, but to make them look like something a fish would want to eat.
The book, ''Tying and Fishing the Fuzzy Nymphs," also put many of the area rivers around his home on the map, so to speak. Additionally, it was the first to enter the modern, mainstream fly-fishing literature by a Western author.
Other Patterns
While the "fuzzy nymph" collection highlights his nymph patterns, Polly was also a prolific tyer and innovator of salmon, steelhead and other flies.
One of these, “The Silver Garland,” was lauded in 1953 by no less than A.J. McClane in his keystone work, “The Practical Fly Fisherman.”
Silver Garland
Courtesy of Fly Anglers Online
This fly, like most of Rosborough's patterns, used common materials in a unique way. True to its name, the 'Silver Garland' employed metallic Christmas garland to form the body!
You can read more about it here: The Bass Flies of A.J. McClane, part 2
Another of Polly's books, ''Reminiscences of 50 Years of Flyrodding,'' was printed in only 600 copies, in three cover versions.
This was a truly limited series, with each copy numbered and signed by Polly himself. It was a personal memoir that harkened back to an era of fishing not to be seen again.
As you might imagine, it is now pretty rare and costly. Anyone who has a copy can call himself lucky.
In 1975, at the age of 73, Rosborough was honored to receive Buz Buszek Memorial Award for making, "significant contributions to the art of fly tying."
Personal Life
Polly was married once for 13 years; the records I can find indicate her name was Goldie. But a lot of water had passed under that particular bridge, he would say, and he spoke little of her.
Rather, Polly's eventual love was a young woman named, Carol, who worked for him tying flies. But, alas, it was a May-December relationship; he was 47 years her senior. He thought it unfair for her to waste her life on an old man, as he put it, so they ended the relationship.
He never remarried, and he had no children.
However, Rosborough was not a bitter man; he loved living, and he took advantage of it.
He built a tidy nest egg from his books and fly tying, and he was grateful for that.
"I don't have to hunt orders anymore... it's nice to be famous in your own time. Seeing us early guys being appreciated is the most valuable thing I have," he once told an interviewer. Gratitude was a quality of his personality, and his many friends and acquaintances were proof of that. The entire town of Chiloquin considered him their own.
Polly was also a hard worker. "I left home when I was 16," he said, "and made my own way
ever since."
He worked every day of his life, and was a renowned night owl. His usual routine was to sleep quite late, and work from noon until well into the night, except when he was fishing or prospecting.
"I never give myself a day off, just to goof off," he said.
A willing teacher, he would sit and help anyone at the fly tying desk. He also corresponded with many people through the years, famous and not famous. He didn't look down his nose at folks and he was a man who liked to talk, after all. He enjoyed sharing his vast knowledge.
He had another passion, too, as an amateur mineralogist. He knew the geology of the land around him, intimately, and he always harbored hopes for another big silver find in the Oregon Cascade.
Ernest Herbert, "Polly," Rosborough passed away in December of 1997, at a nursing home near Klamath Falls, Oregon.
He was 95.
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References
1. http://castingaround.anthonynaples.com/2010/02/casual-dress-some-variations-on-a-theme
2. Rosborough
Casual Dress Nymph, http://www.johnkreft.com/rosborough-casual-dress-nymph/
3. Fly
Fish Ohio, http://www.flyfishohio.com/Casual_Dress_Nymph.htm
4.
http://articles.latimes.com/1989-07-12/sports/sp-3583_1_polly-rosborough
5. https://www.nytimes.com/1997/12/28/sports/ernest-rosborough-95-pioneer-of-modern-fly-fishing-is-dead.html
6.
You Tube Video: Hans
Weilenmann https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRhmqHOaaZI
7.
YouTube video Tim Flagler https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58st39qvH-M
8.
YouTube Joe Cornwall FFO Dubbing
loophttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niVlJD8glVA
9. http://www.spencerewert.com/WesternTroutFlies/PollyRosborough.html
11.
https://natgreeneflyfishers.com/biographics.htm#pollyrosborough
