Another somber post this week, and a couple of historical photos in remembrance of Jim Brang, who passed away back in April at the age of 81 after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. Brang, as you might recall, was an avid bass angler and writer whose work appeared in numerous outdoor magazines, most notably to bass anglers, Fishing Facts and Bassmaster magazine, primarily in the 1980s and 1990s.
He originally worked for the Postal Service but was later an operations manager for a local seating company. He was an avid angler, and originally, a serious and successful local tournament competitor. But he stopped fishing tournaments and took up guiding part-time, along with all his writing endeavors, which kept him busy in the fishing industry.
A couple excerpts from a 1982 news story on Brang and his passion for bass:
“Tournament fishing takes the fun out of Brang’s fishing. ‘It gets to be work,’ he says. ‘Too much tension, too much rush. Tournament fishing is like going to a carnival,’ he comments. ‘You pay a dollar to try and win a 10-cent cigar.’”
“The thrill of bass fishing is finding the fish, finding the pattern. Once I’ve found that, the challenge is over. You could fill the boat. Once I’ve accomplished that, finding the fish, finding the productive pattern for that particular day, I feel like I can load my boat on the trailer and take it home.”
Being from Indiana, where Jim was also located, I was always particularly interested in anything he wrote, because his information was usually founded on local waters I also fished every week. Rest in peace, Jim.
