Ted Fay

Ted Fay (1904–1983) was an American fly fisherman, fly tyer, fishing guide, and fly shop owner known for popularizing the short-line nymphing fishing technique in the United States. Around 1951 he founded the Ted Fay Fly Shop, California’s oldest-running fly fishing store, located in Dunsmuir.

During his time in Dunsmuir he developed enduring fly patterns such as the Caddis Larvae, the Maggie, and the Cro Fly. He worked to promote local tourism, and is often credited with establishing the Upper Sacramento River as a fly fishing destination. In 1984, Fay was posthumously inducted into the Northern California Fly Fishing Hall of Fame for his contributions to the sport.

Biography Ted Fay was born on August 16, 1904 in Tularosa, New Mexico. Around 1914, the Fey family embarked on a trip via covered wagon to migrate to Los Angeles. Ted's father then worked as a traveling salesman, frequently taking him on his trips to Northern California. Together they visited Dunsmuir for the first time around 1920.

During the first half of the 1940s, Ted worked as a grocery distributor in Oakland, California, and would regularly drive his grocery truck through Highway 99 to fish the Upper Sacramento River.

Meeting Ted Towendolly It was during this time that Ted Fay met Ted Towendolly, a Wintu man who had been the first fly fishing guide on the Upper Sacramento River. In the 1920s Towendolly developed heavily weighted flies such as the Black Bomber, as well as variations of the Black and Brown Spent Wing, Burlap fly, and Peacock fly. He employed these heavy flies using a novel technique that would come to be known as short-line nymphing. Towendolly taught Fay how to tie his weighted flies and fish them with his technique, fostering what would become a lifelong friendship.

Life in Dunsmuir In the spring of 1951, Fay moved to Dunsmuir together with his wife, Vivienne, and two of their four children, their son Mike and daughter Shirley. They purchased the Lookout Point Motel inside which Fay operated a small fly fishing shop.

To supply the store, Fay initially bought flies from Towendolly, but he later tied his own based on Towendolly’s recipes, as well as developing new patterns himself.

To the guests of the motel Fay offered free fishing advice and guiding services. These services proved popular, and the motel quickly became a destination among fly fishermen. Gaining international reputation over time, the motel started drawing in a clientele of famous anglers like Joe Brooks, Jack Horner, Jim Green, Walton Powell, as well as celebrities like William Conrad, Bob Wilson, Pete McCloskey, among others. Vince Claward, president of the Upper Sacramento River Exchange, a watershed stewardship organization operating in Siskiyou County, gifted a set of Ted Fay flies to then-president George W. Bush. Through his advice, guiding services, and weighted flies, Fay popularized Towendolly’s short-line nymphing technique, which came to be known in the '60s and '70s as the Ted Fay method.

While Fay was closest to the Upper Sacramento river and fished it intensely, to the point of earning the nickname of "Sage of the Sacramento", he also fished nearby trout rivers like the Klamath, Salmon, Trinity, and McCloud.

Fay was active in Dunsmuir's community and local affairs, serving as Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce’s Fish and Game committee (from December 1954), and later president of the Dunsmuir Chamber of Commerce (from December 1959), as well as being Chairman of the local Rotary Club. Fay also regularly published fishing reports for the Sacramento and McCloud rivers in Californian newspapers such as the San Francisco Examiner, The Sacramento Bee, the Oakland Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times. His goal was bolstering local tourism and putting the Upper Sacramento area (and specifically Dunsmuir) on the map as a fly-fishing destination, an effort that proved successful. To counter this, Fay started using the Mustad #9 hook, an unusual size that would make his original flies easier to identify. Mustad would eventually discontinue its #9 hook, and Fay was forced to go back to a #8.thumb

Ted Fay Fly Shop The Ted Fay Fly Shop is the longest-running fly fishing store in California, and one of the oldest overall in the Western United States. After Fay’s death, Joe Kimsey, a fly fisherman who worked for Fay as a fly tier and guide at the shop, bought the store from the Fay estate and operated it out of the Garden Motel, later renamed to the current Acorn Inn. Throughout its history the store moved five times across Dunsmuir, until March 2007 when it relocated to its current location at 5732 Dunsmuir Avenue, following a ribbon cutting ceremony by the Dunsmuir Chamber of Commerce.

A memorial plaque in Dunsmuir City Park, just across the Upper Sacramento River, celebrates Ted Fay as a “master flyfisher [and] Dunsmuir guide” whose “legend will remain forever on these rippling waters”.