The first issue of Gray’s Sporting Journal appeared in the fall of 1975 with a commitment by its founders Ed and Rebecca Gray to “…publish the finest outdoor writing, photography and art work that we can find.”

During that first decade, the Grays were clearly true to their promise regarding fly fishing as many prominent figures in the field contributed to the journal. For instance, Gray’s Sporting Journal (vol. 2 no. 2) features articles from Robert Traver, Nick Lyons, Art Flick, Russell Chatham and sparse Grey Hackle. As they proudly declared in an early issue, “Our authors wrote literature, and we knew that would be the difference between us and the other magazines.”

Paralleling the high-quality literature, the cover frequently displayed the work of a renowned fly fishing artist, and in this exhibit we present seven wonderful examples on view in the museum’s Gardner L. Grant Library.