A rarity: Larry Snyder fishing with a Pro Troll flasher. He rarely used anything other than a herring and lead weight. (Natalie Behring/The Columbian)
Larry Snyder, former long-time president of the Vancouver Wildlife League and for three decades a Columbia River sport-fishing activist, has died. He was 75.
Snyder succumbed Sunday after an extended bout with cancer.
“It’s a huge loss considering all he did for wildlife,’’ said Chuck Cheshire, who succeeded Snyder in 2015 as president of the wildlife group. “He was a ninja when it came to letter writing. The club got massive respect because Larry’s letters were so well researched and well written. You could tell he’d been a school teacher.’’
A Vancouver native, Snyder graduated from Hudson’s Bay High School in 1958, attended Clark College for two years and graduated from Portland State University.
After one year of teaching ninth grade in The Dalles, Ore., Snyder taught for 30 years at Shumway and Jason Lee junior high schools in Vancouver. He was a fill-in school administrator intermittently after retirement. He had three master’s degrees.
Snyder was a regular salmon and steelhead angler in the lower Columbia and its tributaries for 50 years. He often could be found fishing the Longview-to-Vancouver reach of the river in a 15-foot Smokercraft boat.
Snyder was known for: a) trolling, never anchoring; and, b) very basic gear.
“There’s no politically correct way to say what Larry felt about anchor fishermen,’’ said Winston Falls of Vancouver, a friend and fishing partner of Snyder’s since high school.
“He’d say to me: ‘They’re Neanderthals. When they walk up the ramp their knuckles are dragging on the ground,’ ’’ Falls said.
Snyder’s idea of salmon fishing gear was a plug-cut herring and a sinker.
“He believed the less you had on your line the more fish you’d catch,’’ Falls said.
It was in the late 1970s and 1980s when Snyder became a sport-fishing activist. He was secretary of the Vancouver Wildlife League for many years before becoming president.
He said in an October interview he felt the Department of Fish and Wildlife used to favored commercial interests.
Snyder often testified at Columbia River Compact meetings and occasionally before the state Fish and Wildlife Commission or Port of Vancouver Commission.
In those early days, before the current crop of sport-fishing groups began to flourish and gain strength, Snyder was one of a very small cadre politicking for larger salmon allocations and better seasons.
“I felt like I was beating my head against a stone wall because we were too few,’’ he said. “We held off the hordes until the reinforcements arrived.’’
Snyder also loved waterfowl hunting.
“He had such a calm demeanor,’’ Cheshire said. “I’m glad I had the opportunity to hunt and fish with him.’’
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