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Angler Profiles
by Craig Picard
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| A series of articles introducing RISAA members to the rest of the club. |
| (from the September, 2001 newsletter) HARRY TEMPLETON |
Harry has been a RISSA member since December of 2000. Prior to joining,
Harry signed up to receive the monthly newsletter and attended some monthly
meetings. Harry enjoyed the newsletter and liked the quality of information
he received from the monthly meetings and decided to join. He
even got one of his fishing buddies, Ed Skwirz, to join. Harry and Ed participated in the Take-A-City-Kid Fishing Day, but the weekend got off to a horrible start when Ed's boat was nearly cut in half. They were bringing Ed's boat up the Bay to Warwick in dense fog, when they were hit by a large cabin cruiser. No one was hurt, but I don't think the boat survived. When you see Harry or Ed ask them for the story. Harry is a regular at monthly meetings. Harry grew up in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where he still calls home. He also has a summer place in East Matunuck. Since retiring from Blackstone Valley Electric Company, Harry has a lot of time to focus on fishing. He has a boat that he keeps at Kenport Marina called Nugget. The boat is named after a family dog. These days Harry mostly fishes with his wife Audrey or Ed Skwirz. Harry and Audrey have been fishing together since they were dating. Harry would pick her up on the way to Wallum Lake, and her father didn't mind the early hour because he was a fisherman as well. Harry's early salwater fishing years were spent in a small boat on the Seekonk and Providence Rivers. Harry and his family often made the hour trip to East Matunuck from Pawtucket to do some fishing and shellfishing in Potters Pond. He remembers when that pond was full of clams, quahogs, scallops, blue crabs, and jumbo flatfish. Back then a bushel basket was much easier to fill. He and his family enjoyed Potters Pond so much that they used to rent a place for a week each summer not too far from where their current place is located. Harry is the perfect example of a well-rounded fisherman. He fishes both fresh and salt water. He uses a fly rod and conventional rod and reel in both salt and fresh. Freshwater fishing includes trout and salmon, while saltwater fishing includes flounder, scup, seabass, stripers, blues, cod, and tuna. He also makes all of his own tackle. During the winter when he can't get out on the water, Harry spends time getting ready for the upcoming season. He casts his own sinkers and leadheads in a variety of sizes and ties fresh and saltwater flies. He also makes his own tubes for stripers and dyes them himself, and makes a nice PVC tube to store them in. One of the larger parts of his tackle collection are fluke rigs. He makes several varieties from glow-in-the-dark beads to different colored spinners with small and large rubber squids. He said that there are a few that get more fish than others, but he continues to come up with different combinations to see what this years' fluke like. Harry has two children, a daughter Debra and a son Rich. Many of you may know Rich as he is Capt. Rich Templeton of the charterboat Restless based from Snug Harbor. Harry spends some of his time during the year filling in as the mate on his son's boat. He admits that it is a lot of work being a mate. He has to do everything from snapping 'chutes to baiting hooks. He said that the longest days are the offshore charters. They leave the dock at 5:00 a.m. and do not return until 5:00 p.m. After they finish cleaning the fish, the charter leaves and then they have to wash down the boat and fill up with ice and fuel for the next days charter. Although being aboard Restless can equal long hours and hard work, it has also been a source of some memorable fishing trips. One of the trips was an offshore trip when they got into a large school of hungry bluefin tuna. Harry said that as fast as he could put a butterfish on the hook and get it into the water, they had one hooked. Before Harry could get another hook baited the angler already had the fish within sight. After the fish was tagged or gaffed, Harry would get another one hooked. This went on for hours and by the end of the day they had caught over twenty small to medium bluefin. The quota only allowed them to keep two and the rest were tagged and released to someday grow into giants. Another memorable and, in one author's eyes, historic day on a tuna fishing trip in the early 1990's. Harry was on his son's boat and hooked a tuna on a fly. Back then it was unheard of to hook and land a tuna on light tackle, nevermind on a fly. It was so rare that one of the other charter boats in the area stopped fishing and came over to where Harry was so that he and his charter could watch Harry fight a tuna on a fly rod. Everyone on both boats were telling Harry how to fight the fish. Some even said that the old fiberglass fly rod would break in two, but being the smooth angler he was, Harry brought the fish to the boat. By the way, the name of the charter boat that came over to watch was the Early Bird and the captain was Dave Preble. Dave makes mention of Harry and that day in the first paragraph of the first chapter in his book Fly Fishing Offshore: Cape Cod to Hatteras. |
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