After hearing about The Thrill of the Chase in early 2021 and contemplating Forrest Fenn’s poem, my research focused on the stretch of the Madison river within Yellowstone National Park, and specifically on Nine Mile Hole. I shared some of that research on hintofriches.com to help people understand the significance of this celebrated fishing location. Passages by Kim Eagle, Ernest Schwiebert, Charles Brooks and Howard Back were sufficient, I felt, to explain the unique characteristics of Nine Mile Hole and to pinpoint its defining feature.
Among the research material I didn’t share back then was an article from a Texas newspaper, dated August 27, 1946, which I’ve reproduced below. The author of the piece describes a fishing trip that he and a companion took to West Yellowstone, Montana. It includes a brief encounter with Charles Simpson, whom you might recognize as Forrest Fenn’s grandfather. The star of the piece, however, is Forrest’s father, Marvin Fenn. The article offers a glimpse into the respect Marvin commanded as an expert fishing guide.
The backdrop for these tales of old Charlie Simpson and Marvin Fenn is one that should, by now, be familiar to those in the Fenn community — Nine Mile Hole.
I enjoyed revisiting the article and hope you like it too.
Jes’ a Dam Lie
by Pop Boone
(Editor’s Note — Pop Boone, sports editor of The Fort Worth Press, recently returned from a trout fishing excursion into Montana, and since his column “Jes’ a Dam Lie,” currently running, should provide interesting reading to sportsmen of this section, we have received permission to run the highlights of his outing. Several fishermen from this area have fished in the very waters described by Pop. Anyway, here’s the first installment.)
High spots in the serial recital of a vacation trip to Montana which opens with these lines will be found in the tying in with Snake River trout, the presence of a swell character name of Marvin Fenn, the wounding of the author by a treacherous spring channel and the payment of $100.55 for a pair of nylons.
However spaced in between these high spots will be many incidents of travel and fishing which I hope will be found not only useful to those who may make the same trip but interesting besides — so interesting that mayhap it may prove, in a small measure, almost a vacation trip for those who had to skip same this year.
I planned this one far in advance — making out my travel schedule and writing letters ahead for reservations as long as six weeks to two months preceding departure. Every request for a reservation was acknowledged and in all but one instance were found waiting for us.
We found travel to be as heavy as it was said to be. Every tourist court hung out the “No Vacancy” sign early; hotels laughed at folks who had “taken a chance.” We heard in Yellowstone Park that as many as 500 people slept in their cars at night. And those nights were as cold as 35, believe it or not.
If any belated vacationists plan a trip to the Park or beyond, they should be reasonably sure of a place to lay their weary heads or at least take along a flock of blankets. Also, and this is very important, they should have ample tire insurance, with at least six good tires. If you don’t believe this latter, ask me.
I was told in Montana, Wyoming and Colorado that not one new standard size tire was available in the three states. When you get through reading this serial, if any, you’ll agree with me, although I was home on schedule and wriggled out of every tire hole I fell into.
My guess as to location was perfect. I do not think there’s a greater fishing spot in the world than West Yellowstone, Mont. Of course, if you’ve never been there, you should plan to employ a guide for a day or so if you can get one and find out how to fish, get an idea of where and other advice.
Like babes in the Wood, Ernst Jordan and myself depended on our automatic reels, ordinary fly-rod lines and inadequate waders to carry us through two weeks of fishing in eastern Montana. We had been up there a couple or three times, caught some fish and thought we knew something about the country.
But, after we met Marvin Fenn, a camp owner, professional guide and winter-time superintendent of schools at Temple, Tex., we didn’t feel so cocky.
We saw thousands of other Babes in the Wood, fishing along the banks and never getting hold of a big one; we saw hundreds of others like ourselves, wading in boots or in tennis shoes, who had little luck. But the boys who get the fish — the hosses — are equipped for the job.
First, waders are almost imperative — waders which permit one to go out above the waist and reach the opposite bank with a long cast. Second, if the fisherman expects to land the big ones, especially in fast water where most of them hang out, he needs a single-action reel, a tapered line with good backlog of at least 25 yards of linen line. Also he needs a stout tapered leader — a Pacific Coast Stump Puller will do.
Waders nowadays, even the medium-priced ones, are the berries. They’re easy to put on and easy to take off and you’re just as dry when you come out as when you went in. Marvin allowed us to wear a couple of pair he had found at a general store at Old Faithful this summer — Later he even equipped us with single-action reels and lines.
Don’t buy any flies. This is like telling an angler to go fishing but don’t go near the water. This late July and early August trip of the Jordan-Boone combination could have been pulled off with a half dozen flies each — that is if you want to call a wooly worm a fly. As a matter of fact, black ones with black hackle, about №8’s — caught all the fish we caught, which were not too many.
After ten years of two-week visits to trout country, Ernst and I thought we knew a lot about the racket, but it took Marvin Fenn just about ten minutes to put us in the deep novice class. We never advanced very far, but brother we caught some good ones and had hold of others which we will feel in our day — and night — dreaming for another year.
Bein’ poor folks, so to speak, the Jordans and Boones lay in a supply of groceries before starting a trip. Lena generally gets a hunk of ham and bakes it. Ernst he gets a hunk of Swiss cheese and some mustard. Then there is a bottle of milk, some hard-boiled aigs supplied by Mom and a box of home-made cookies thrown in for good measure by Lena.
Thus we are equipped to turn up our noses at eating places at lunch time. Besides, and this helps a lot, we don’t stop. The wheels just keep on turning. And it solves an eating problem these days, when you take a full luncheon, even in the little places — and like it. No a la carte any more.
Anyhow, we had my running board ice box sitting on its little home-made seat in the rear. In it was the milk and some bottles of coke. On top was the grocery department.
My carrier box on top of the car was full and the trunk was full when we finally finished packing on the morning of July 20.
Right here, I would like to detour the trip story to put in a big holler about the roads in Colorado, at least the main highways 85 and 87. Going out of Trinidad it’s still terrible for a few miles. But I learned to drive the weaving old concrete from there to Denver and so won’t yelp too much. I do think, however, with the high sales and road taxes in a state which depends so much on the sucker — I mean tourist — trade Colorado could keep at least that main highway in better condition.
With it all, we arrived at Colorado Springs in good time and I invaded the formidable array of seeming millionaires on the piazza of the Antlers Hotel. They obviously all tried to make us out and failing let it go at that. We did the same thing.
Here I found but one reservation. A very blase young gent was very nice in an aloof sort of a way, but told me all he did around there was sell rooms and had none to sell except on reservation.
Arriving at our destination, one of the first things Ernest Jordan and I did after we had unloaded the car, which is some job, by the way, was to drive out to C. K. Simpson’s Cabins to get a line on Marvin Fenn, their son-in-law. Mr. and Mrs. Simpson, who call Fort Worth their home despite the fact they have conducted a cabin camp in West Yellowstone for many years, split the year between the two “homes”.
We found the “No Vacancy” sign on the big camp and Mr. Simpson absent. He was at the “Nine Mile Hole” of the Madison, dragging out a few of those big Madison river trouts.
So Ernest and I found the grocery stores and laid in some ammunition in the way of food. Meat seemed very scarce and dark-red looking, what there was of it. Produce was good, mostly fresh Utah and California — but generally quite a bit higher than it is here.
We had our first meal in Cabin 6 at Three Bears, where we had stayed one time on our way out of the Madison-river sector at Ennis. Had we known about the Simpsons, we probably would have made reservations there.
Soon after dinner, Mr. Simpson came in to see us to ask us to go to the nine-mile hole with him early the next morning. We were pretty tired, however, and decided to sleep a little late. We found the weather exactly as we remembered it. Temperatures during the “heat” of the day sometimes goes as high as 90, but even Mom, who is allergic to a hot sun, could sit right out in it and sun herself. Along at dusk, it was perfect. By 9 the cabin doors were shut: at 3 a.m. it hit right around 36 each morning. So we were under a couple of blankets. Perfect weather — day after day after day.
After Mr. Simpson left, it wasn’t long before Marvin Fenn dropped in. He had been fishing near the mouth of the Madison, where it starts piling up into Lake Hebgen — and did he bring in the fish? Boy, they were beauts and he had the limit, mostly 16-inch up to 19-inch rainbows.
However, we stuck to our resolution to take it easy that first morning, although we were getting pretty hot. We wanted to get licenses, which are $3 for 10 days to out-of-state fishermen. Also, we needed flies, leaders and other stuff like that. Marvin was disappointed when I said I had been unable to get any waders and planned to wear jungle boots and sweat out the cold water, if you can understand the expression.
He even said Ernst’s boots would be inadequate in most of the places he would take us. He said his next party would be Fort Worth folks and they would fish 22 straight days starting August 1, so he had a week to give us.
Marvin also said he had a fish-fry planned for the next day or two and he thought we would enjoy it. He was right as a fox.
While I saw several fishermen in the Madison and other Park streams without either boots or waders, I soon found out my plan for wading in so-called jungle boots and old trousers was no good. I certainly would not go up there into Montana again without breast-high waders.
My first experience without either boots or waders was not good. Ernst Jordan and myself went fishing our first time early in the second morning we spent at West Yellowstone.
Our friend, Marvin Fenn, took us to Nine-Mile Hole.
This spot is on the main road from the West Gate to Norris Junction. As might be imagined, it is just nine miles from the gate. It looks just like all the rest of the Madison, but a certain spot near the opposite bank is a hangout for both rainbow and browns. Marvin, of course knows right where that certain spot is.
He told us he had known of as many as 20 good fish being taken out of that hole morning and afternoon day after day. When we arrived our second morning in Montana, lack of fish cleanings along the bank indicated the good water was undisturbed.
I donned my jungle boots and waded bravely into the water. It was cold — every step — but after a moment the water actually seemed warm. I felt no chill and waded beyond my waist. Marvin had told me the spot to hit and about my third cast I hooked a nice 16-inch rainbow. I may have been a little fast with him, but under Marvin’s guidance, I soon had him in the net.
The first thing one does when he hooks a fish up there is to break for the still, shallow water near the bank. Then he starts walking downstream with his fighting fish, giving line in the clutches and taking it up if he can do so much without too much pressure. My first fish was a beaut, but he finished me for the trip.
Whether it was the excitement, the chill or the altitude, I’ll never know, but I really felt terrible as I waded out to give the other guys a break. After Marvin hooked a fish and Ernst was busy with a color camera, I started to wade out again and had to wade back. I was sure I had a heart attack or something.
I dressed right quick and spent the rest of the morning wondering if I had driven 1500 miles to fish — and a leaky heart or something was all set to thwart me.
Ernst took a long lesson in casting from Marvin, who caught some beauties as he went along with his lesson. But I sat in the car or took movies and wondered and felt pretty dawg-gonne defeated.
On one or two occasions in my long and more or less dissipated career I’ve hung a tarpon on a pier at Galveston or Aransas Pass and thus attracted a large crowd of Sunday visitors as an audience. But my first large trout audience bobbed up on my initial day at Yellowstone Park recently.
We were fishing the nine-mile hole of the Madison, which is alongside the main road between West Yellowstone and Norris Junction. My fish wasn’t a particularly large one — about a 17-inch Brownie — but he was the liveliest I’d had hold of.
Believe it or not, I blocked traffic on the road. Cars backed up in both lanes; spectators piled out and watched the scrap from the bank. This smallish Brownie was a canny battler. He tried to get in every weed bed in the river; attempted to crawl under every rock or hide in every brush pile. And all the time he was yanking, yanking, yanking in an effort to tear out the hook.
If I do say so, I did a fair job of handling that troublesome bugger but finally brought him to net, and for once did not have my leader knot fastened on the tip when I finished. One guy said he got a shot of me at a time my fish was in the middle of a walk-the-water leap: that he would send me the negative. But up to now I have not received same.
We had waders that afternoon. Believe it or not, Marvin Fenn had dipped into his storehouse and brought out brand new waders for both Ernst Jordan and myself. Ernst, by the way, was laying that fly on the water in long casts as slick as grease by now. He hooked and landed the biggest fish of the day — a 20-inch Brownie which really gave him a fit.
We had 11 pretty good fish that afternoon, five of them being caught by Marvin, who loafed quite a bit. He had invited all of us to a fish fry in a public camp grounds and just before dark we took off the waders and lit out. Marvin had everything ready, even to fileting the fish he caught the day before. I do not know if there is such a word as fileting, but we’ll let ‘er slide.
When we reached the camp grounds, the tables were occupied. But one party, which was merely sitting there fanning the breeze, called to us to take over. They even had brought a stack of stovewood — and did that fire feel good to us?
Marvin had a folding gasoline camp stove. He took the thin fillets and put them in a paper sack with some cornmeal, salt and pepper; gave them a shaking up, then dropped ’em in the skillet; he had sliced tomatoes, potato bread, potato chips, olives — oh, the guy knows how to set a table all right. The fish and everything were delicious and the wood lasted just long enough to see us through the meal and a clean-up.
Taking the bit in our teeth, Ernst Jordan and I decided to step out on our own the third day in West Yellowstone, Mont. On a previous trip, we hit a jackpot in what is known as the lower Madison river, the section below the dam which creates Lake Hebgen.
On that previous time, however, the water was high and muddy and the trout were hitting grasshoppers instead of flies. I never gave a river a stiffer beating than I did on this last trip — and so far as I know I never had a strike. Ernst had a couple of strikes but after a 45-mile ride, including a very rough journey across a meadow and down a rocky hillside from the “bench,” we racked up a complete waterhaul and lost another of the precious 14 days of fishing and vacation time.
The Madison River, by the way, is quite a stream. It is formed, as you may know, by the junction of the Firehole and Gibbon rivers inside Yellowstone Park. It soon runs into Lake Hebgen, which, in my opinion, produces more fish than any other similar lake in the section. Several boat concessions furnish boats with motors and cafeteria lures and we have counted more than 30 boats on the lake at a time. Most of them catch some fish — often the limit of 15.
Many fish also go up the Madison (illegible), the South Fork and the Grayling and other streams which empty into the lake.
(illegible) Marvin Fenn, the Temple, Tex. School superintendent (illegible) He knows all the holes around West Yellowstone, even into Idaho and Wyoming.
Another Temple school teacher name of Wood, also a summer guide, had reported to Marvin that the Snake river was about ripe. And Marvin was as excited as a kid just let out of Sunday School. He told us some tall tales of the Snake river fish — all of which subsequently were proven to be on the mild side instead of blown up.
Marvin explained that the Snake river fish were a breed of their own. They call ’em silver sides in Idaho. They’re undoubtedly crossed with rainbows — either that or the usual pink stripe of the rainbow is faded by the Lake Henry or Snake river water, because the pink is almost lost on these fish.
They’re a fighting breed, much greater fighters for their size than any fish I ever had on the end of a line. They hit solid, almost always break water on their strike and almost invariably hook themselves. Everything those Snake river fish do is strenuous.
The Brady Standard and Heart O’ Texas News, Vol. 38 №43 (August 27, 1946)
