Posts by Joe Shields

Our guide was prepared. Matt Miles had a pair of 11-weight fly rods rigged with sinking line stored in the drift boat’s gunnels. He had extra 10-weights onboard and self-tied, out- landishly large, multicolored flies to attract monsters that should not exist in Virginia’s fresh waters. Chris Young and I thought we were prepared, too–for…

William Styron is a distinctive voice of the South and successor to William Faulkner. His journey as a Pulitzer Prize-winning author began at Christchurch School, along the banks of the Rappahannock River, a few miles above the Chesapeake Bay. He graduated from there in 1942. In This Quiet Dust: And Other Writings, Styron recalled: “Christchurch…

Northbound Interstate 295 crosses high above the Delaware River and drops into Pennsville, New Jersey, home of M&M Hunting Preserve and shotgun and sporting clays prodigy Anthony I. Matarese Jr. Born in 1984, Matarese started shooting sporting clays at age six, the same year he shot his first deer on his family’s property. Three generations…

I have owned several dogs: a Dalmatian that bit friends, a Great Dane that ate a couch and a Shih Tzu that barked at the sky. Today I own a fat Dachshund that is not house broken and an English  Springer  spaniel  with a misspelled name. (Called “Gauge” to reflect his gun-dog heritage, the name…