Name Paul Young | ||
Paul Holden Young (b. Arkansas, 1890 - d. Michigan, April 28, 1960) was master bamboo fly rod maker, fly tyer and fly fishing innovator. The work of Paul Young is greatly admired by anglers and collectors today.
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Early life
Paul Young was born in Cherry Valley, Arkansas. He fished as a child in the Mississippi River and the Ozarks. He was a hunter and taxidermist and graduated from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville in 1912. He traveled throughout the U.S. and Canada fishing and hunting. Shortly after marrying Martha Marie in 1921, he moved to Detroit, Michigan, and three years later, opened a fishing tackle store there. It became a popular destination for serious fly fisherman of the mid-west.
Fly Rod Developments
Paul Young was one of the most experimental craftsmen in rodmaking. He was a restless artisan who pushed the boundaries of fly rod design, although he made a relatively limited number for his time.
Restless Artisan
It has been said that Young was not as interested in the aesthetics of a fly rod as much as he was in lightweight and functionality. He first developed a specially shaped grip with an impression for the caster's thumb. This idea was later adopted by Wes Jordan for his South Bend fly rods. He used aluminum for his reel seats and ferrules, and invented a unique skeletal grips which left spaces between the cork rings. His desire to shed as much weight as possible from a fly rod created an aesthetic all its own.
The Paul H. Young Company outsourced fishing rod construction to companies: Heddon, South Bend Bait Company and E.W. Edwards.
Ring of Fire
Young developed a ringed gas jet to heat temper the bamboo for his rods. This "ring of fire" gave his rods a greater power to weight ratio and the rich, flamed appearance that was signature to his designs. He used a surplus military bomb hoist to construct a bamboo binder and developed his own bamboo milling machine to alleviate the need to plane bamboo strips by hand.
The 'Para' Paradigm
Young's signature tapers (measured diameter of a rod, determining its performance characteristics) were known as parabolic, a term coined by Everett Garrison, a rodmaker who used the term to describe a prototype fly rod made by Charles Ritz and were more radical than other contemporary designs of its type. Paul Young was most famous for his 'Midge', a four weight rod measuring six feet, three inches. Originally intended for the challenging, light-tackle needs of sophisticated chalk-stream fly fisherman, the 'Midge' rod was put to uses its creator never intended, such as landing Atlantic Salmon.
Arnold Gingrich said in his The Joys of Trout: "He was venerated in the last decade of his life as "the Stradivari of the Midge rod", and died enjoying near-legendary status as a cult figure."
Paul Young died in 1960, his legacy was carried on by his son, John Young and protege R.W. Summers.