John Springer's Story
Dr. Dick
Another Brother of the Angle died recently, Dr Richard Jogodnick. If
you’ve been a member of this club for awhile, you’d remember him
because of his slide presentations. Dr. Dick, as I called him, did not just
show slides of his vacation or of all the big fish he caught, he was a
teacher at heart. He truly enjoyed showing people how to catch the
fish in the pictures. He did this by explaining where they lived, river
entomology, and of course, the fly that caught the fish. He truly
enjoyed photography, and it showed by how many pictures he would throw away,
so when you saw his program you saw the best shots. As I said he was a
teacher. I saw this in how he took questions during and after his
presentations. A fellow that saw one of his last shows still talks about
how much he learned from him. We never forget the people that take the
time to teach us. Dr. Dick and I only went fishing about 20 times
because of his practice and my hours on the railroad, but we were always in
contact by way of the computer and the phone. We spent much time
“fishing” that way. He loved to get my fishing reports each time I went
out, not only to hear about fishing but because I always include what I
eat when I fish. We both loved to eat and shared many good meals at the
fine restaurants that he knew about. As they were always Italian, it
would be safe to say he loved Italian food. I remember one night,
before I spoke at his TU chapter, they took me out to dinner. I had never
seen anyone dip their bread in olive oil. As I was watching him do it
while I put butter on my bread, he looked up and said to me “John, this
coats your arteries, that clogs them.” We laughed, but once again, he
taught someone something.
He was a collector of antique fly fishing tackle and could tie any
fly from a caddis worm to the most beautiful full dressed Salmon fly.
Something else we had in common was our love for teaching kids about fly
tying and fishing. He knew that I taught two of these programs for many
years. On my last visit he said how sorry he was that now that he was
going to have more time (I guess he meant being retired), he would have
loved to come to help me with the deaf kids my friends and I teach.
That meant a great deal to me.
I went fishing in South Carolina after our last visit and told him I
would come to see him when I returned so that I could tell him about
the trip. I also told him how I think of my friends that are gone when I
fish and that I wanted him to come to visit me while I fished and to
give me a sign. He smiled and said he would. On a cloudy day fishing the
Chattooga River, four days after our visit, I was thinking of him and
suddenly a very small hatch of Blue Wing Olives came off the river. To
those of you that fish, you know that at this point you start looking
for the fish to rise to the top to feed. I kept watching while I fished a
woolly bugger down river, then it happened that a fish rose and took
one of the bugs. I kept watching the water for more but there was none.
I knew then that Dr. Dick was thinking of me and how, in the future, he
would come to visit me while I fished. I will miss my friend very much
and never forget his friendship. Oh yes, there is one thing we could
never agree on. In the town of Wolf Creek Montana, there is a bar and
restaurant called the Frenchmen and Me. Down river in Craig there is a
place called the Trout Shop. They both have apple pie and I always said
the Trout Shop was better, while he said the Frenchmen and Me was. I
guess that will give us something to talk about when we meet up again.
John Springer