'Bass Professor' Doug Hannon Dies at 66

If you were a bass-obsessed kid coming of age in the early 1980s, there are three things about you I can probably say for certain: you un-ironically rocked a mullet and trucker cap because you honestly, and tragically, thought it looked cool, you obsessively spent every dime of your minimum-wage grocery-store sacker wages on fishing tackle bought at small, independently-owned tackle stores, and you hung on every word written or spoken by a small group of bass fishing pioneers and legends that helped transform the sport into what it is today.

The mullet has thankfully disappeared into the receding hairline of history, most of those small, independent tackle stores that incited so much of our adolescent wonder are long gone, and another of those bass-fishing legends has just passed into memory.

From a press release:
Doug Hannon, a legend in the fishing world known as the “Bass Professor” whose unique expertise in a wide range of design skills and academic subjects in and outside of angling, died Thursday at his home in Keystone, a north Tampa suburb.  Hannon was 66. He recently had neck surgery and was recovering at home said friend Russ Riley, a family spokesman and president of WaveSpin/MicroWave, a fishing components design company Hannon launched eight years ago, and which he served as its chief engineer. Hannon, who was best known by recreational anglers for catching-and-releasing over 800 largemouth bass of 10 or more pounds, also had nearly 20 patents for numerous fishing tackle, lures and boating propulsion designs.

Besides his recent success as a fishing tackle and components inventor Hannon documented the catch-and-release of more than 800 largemouth bass weighing 10 pounds or greater to his credit, making him one of the country's preeminent big-bass authorities. He was also a highly skilled diver, underwater photographer, author, filmmaker and lure designer....As one of the world’s greatest authorities on bass fishing Hannon wrote hundreds of magazine and newspaper articles on his observations. He also penned three books, Hannon's Field Guide for Bass Fishing, Catch Bass, and Big Bass Magic. He filmed and produced videos with 3M called Understanding Bass, Catching Big Bass, and Bass-Formula for Success, which among them won Cleo and Teddy awards.

Doug Hannon was part of a group of bass-fishing personalities that were sort of touchstones of my formative fishing years: guys like videographer Glen Lau, bass researcher and lure designer Loren G. Hill, writers like Homer Circle, TV personalities such as Bill Dance and early bass pros like Rick Clunn. I, and thousands of others, read, watched, and followed them religiously. I think I read every word Doug Hannon ever penned in those early BASSMaster magazines. His stories and videos certainly helped stoke my own interest in fishing. He'll be missed.