Bill Cochran

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Allen Morris has me looking through the collection of black and white photographs I have taken of outdoor subjects through the years, some more than 50 years ago. He is interested in what you have, too.

Morris works for Bass Pro Shops, the Missouri-based mega hunting and fishing catalog business and operator of 42 giant retail stores, with another dozen or so on the way.

One of the “coming soon” stores is headed to Hanover County, in the Richmond area, and that is why Morris was in Virginia recently. He is looking for black and white pictures from the 1800s through the 1960s that can be used to decorate the new store.

“My goal is to celebrate the fishing and hunting in that area and the individuals in your area that fished and hunted in the good ole days,” said Morris.

Each Bass Pro Shops store is different, the idea being to reflect the fishing, hunting and outdoor individuals of the area. The Richmond store, for example, won’t be like the one down the Interstate in Hampton, he said. It will have its own theme and personalities.

So what would be a good theme for a store in the Richmond area? What personality could serve as the outdoor icon of the region?

As for a theme, that wasn’t easy. We settled on the James River, Virginia’s longest and most history-rich stream. In Richmond, it musters one final rush across the fall line before settling into the docile and increasingly salty trip to the Chesapeake Bay.

Pinpointing a personality was a bit easier. Getting the nod from my group was Joe Brooks, one of America’s great anglers and an outstanding writer of books and magazine articles on fishing. Brooks was born in Baltimore (1902) and was buried (1972) in Livingston, Montana, where he frequently fished, but in-between he lived in the Richmond area for a time.

He was fishing editor for Outdoor Life and appeared in many TV films, most notably the American Sportsman.

As a young writer, I was not a personal friend of Brooks, but had the honor of having lunch with him one day and I was an admirer of his work. His “Trout Fishing” probably was his best known book. His writings targeted many species, including bass and saltwater. When you read him, you weren’t just entertained, you were educated.

“Joe Brooks is the person you want to highlight in your store,” we told Morris.

Morris isn’t just looking for famous people. He also is searching for a picture of your grandpa in his Woolrich jacket on a deer stand with snow in the background. Or maybe the camp setting where steam is radiating off damp, wool coats hanging across a chair in front of a fire. Or a fat brook trout sliding into a wicker creel. Maybe a pointing dog so staunch it looks as if it has been chiseled out of stone. He is looking for memories, folklore, tradition, camaraderie and legends, the things that have told the story of outdoor sports through the ages, and continue to do so.

Morris is the imagery specialist of Bass Pro Shops. He is not related to Johnny Morris, who started the Bass Pro Shops empire.

If you have something you think Allen Morris might like to display in the new store, contact him at amorris@basspro.com. Maybe you know a theme or personality that the rest of us haven’t thought about.