WHoward A. Bell (1888–1974) of Wrington was one of the first anglers to adopt an imitative approach to fly fishing on reservoirs in the early twentieth century. At a time when employing flashy ‘attractor’ patterns was the norm he employed the alternative tactic of using artificial flies that represented the shape and form of the creatures present in Blagdon Water where he fished regularly.
WMichael Brown AKA Mick is a British angler who co-hosts several fishing programs with Matt Hayes on Discovery Real Time (channel). He has starred in over 80 programs. He is best known for his love of targeting predator fish, especially pike.
WJohn William Dunne was a British soldier, aeronautical engineer and philosopher. As a young man he fought in the Second Boer War, before becoming a pioneering aeroplane designer in the early years of the 20th century. Dunne worked on automatically stable aircraft, many of which were of tailless swept wing design, to achieve the first certified stable aircraft. He later developed a new approach to dry fly fishing before turning to speculative philosophy, where he achieved some prominence and literary influence through his "serialism" theory on the nature of time and consciousness, explained in his book An Experiment with Time.
WHugh Falkus was a British writer, filmmaker and presenter, World War II pilot and angler. In an extremely varied career, he is perhaps best known for his seminal books on angling, particularly salmon and sea trout fishing; however, he was also a noted filmmaker and broadcaster for the BBC.
WCyril Frisby VC was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. Awarded the VC for his actions in the Battle of Canal du Nord during the First World War, in later life he was a prominent sports fisherman.
WRobson Golightly Green is an English actor, angler, singer-songwriter and presenter.
WFrederic Maurice Halford, pseudonym Detached Badger, was a wealthy and influential British angler and fly fishing author. Halford is most noted for his development and promotion of the dry fly technique on English chalk streams. He is generally accepted as "The Father of Modern Dry Fly Fishing". John Waller Hills, A History of Fly Fishing for Trout (1921) called Halford "The Historian of the Dry Fly".
WJohn Horrocks was the founder and innovator of modern European fly fishing.
WFor other people of the same name see Billy Lane and Billy Lane (footballer)
WRyan Anthony Lloyd is an English footballer who plays as a midfielder for National League North club Hereford.
WMorgan John "Moc" Morgan OBE was a Welsh fly fisherman, administrator, naturalist and television presenter. Born into a rural family, Morgan became a head teacher, but his love of fly-fishing led him into media opportunities in Welsh radio and television. One of the definitive writers of books relating to fly-fishing within Wales, Morgan became an important administrator in Welsh, British and European aspects of the sport.
WArthur Victor Oglesby was a British writer, photographer, filmmaker, broadcaster and fisherman. He was best known for his books on salmon fishing.
WHenry Anthony Pawson was an English sportsman who played cricket and association football and was a leading fly fisherman. He worked as a cricket writer and journalist. He was the son of Guy Pawson, and father of scientist Anthony Pawson.
WCedric Robinson MBE was the Queen's Guide to the Sands, the recognised guide for travellers across the dangerous tidal sands of Morecambe Bay in north west England, for 56 years.
WAlan Scotthorne of England is the first angler to win five individual World Freshwater Angling Championships, which were held at the following venues:1996 1997, 1998 2003 (Madunice, Slovakia Alan Scotthorne2007
WGeorge Edward MacKenzie Skues, usually known as G. E. M. Skues (1858–1949), was a British lawyer, author and fly fisherman most noted for the invention of modern-day nymph fishing and the controversy it caused with the Chalk stream dry fly doctrine developed by Frederic M. Halford. His second book, The Way of a Trout with a Fly (1921) is considered a seminal work on nymph fishing. According to Dr Andrew Herd, the British fly fishing historian, Skues:was, without any doubt, one of the greatest trout fishermen that ever lived. His achievement was the invention of fly fishing with the nymph, a discovery that put a full stop to half a century of stagnation in wet fly fishing for trout, and formed the bedrock for modern sunk fly fishing. Skues' achievement was not without controversy, and provoked what was perhaps the most bitter dispute in fly fishing history.
WThomas Tod Stoddart (1810–1880) was a Scottish angler and poet.
WRobert Venables, was an English soldier from Cheshire, who fought for Parliament in the 1638 to 1651 Wars of the Three Kingdoms, and captured Jamaica in 1655.
WJohn William Vincent was an English seaman and member of Ernest Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. He was one of the five men who accompanied Shackleton on his epic crossing from Elephant Island to South Georgia and was one of only four of the crew of Endurance not to receive the Polar Medal.
WJeremy John Wade is a British television presenter, an author of books on angling, a freshwater detective and a biologist. He is known for his television series River Monsters, Jungle Hooks, Mighty Rivers and Dark Waters.
WRichard Stuart Walker was an English angler.
WIzaak Walton was an English writer. Best known as the author of The Compleat Angler, he also wrote a number of short biographies including one of his friend John Donne. They have been collected under the title of Walton's Lives.