Ray Scott

Ray Scott (1933-2022 ) — Ray Scott’s All-American Bass Tournament in June 1967 on Beaver Lake, Arkansas, is remembered as the seminal event in modern bass fishing, even though it wasn’t the first bass tournament in history. However, his subsequent tournaments — the Dixie Invitational on Smith Lake, Alabama, in October 1967, and the Seminole Lunker on Lake Seminole, Georgia, in February 1968 — may have been more impactful in that they marked the launch of the first professional bass tournament circuit.

It’s one thing to get 106 diehard bass fishermen to pay $100 for the right to fish a three-day tournament, as they did at Beaver Lake. It’s quite another to get them to return, again and again.

Before long, Scott’s fishing derbies became proving grounds for numerous advancements in gear and tactics, and created widespread demand for the newest boats, outboards, trolling motors, electronic devices and even tow vehicles.

In the beginning, Scott just wanted to raise the national profile of bass fishing to be, as he said, “on par with golf.” He did that and more — he created a sport that eventually would be the main driver in a massive sportfishing industry that generates more than $125 billion in economic impact and provides some 800,000 jobs.

His brainchild, the Bassmaster Classic, has become the biggest event in sportfishing and has earned the nickname, “the Super Bowl of Bass Fishing.” With attendance regularly surpassing 100,000 each year, the Classic Outdoors Expo has become one of the main venues for manufacturers to introduce new products to the buying public.

In addition to his tournament trail, Scott began to organize America’s bass anglers, launching the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society (B.A.S.S.) and its membership magazine, Bassmaster, at the beginning of 1968. Soon afterward, he and others, including up-and-coming professional anglers John Powell and Roland Martin, set off on a nine-month tour of the nation, presenting 101 seminars on advanced bass fishing. Packed auditoriums drew each community’s most dedicated anglers, and they formed bass clubs that became affiliated with B.A.S.S. through what is now known as the B.A.S.S. Nation.

Scott used the clubs and the growing clout of his membership to promote conservation and wise fisheries management. When B.A.S.S. filed antipollution lawsuits against more than 200 companies nationwide, Scott was interviewed on national news programs and by major newspaper journalists. The crusade has been credited as the impetus for establishing the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970 and passing the Clean Water Act of 1972.

His best-known contribution to fisheries conservation was no doubt the introduction of the catch-and-release ethic to bass fishing. Beginning in 1972, aerated livewells were required in B.A.S.S. tournament boats, and anglers were incented to keep their catch alive. As a direct result, bass anglers today release all or most of the bass they catch.

In 1984, Scott convinced then-Vice President George H.W. Bush to help secure passage of the Wallop-Breaux Amendment to the excise tax-funded Sportfish Restoration program. The fund in recent years has generated more than $350 million for boating access, fish restoration and other state-run fisheries projects.

Scott met Bush while the latter was campaigning for President of the United States in 1979. The two connected instantly, and Scott was tapped to serve as Bush’s Alabama State Campaign Chairman. According to Scott’s biography, The B.A.S.S. Boss, by Robert Boyle, demonstrations Scott organized on behalf of Bush helped secure his friend’s selection as Ronald Reagan’s running mate during the Republican National Convention in 1980.

Bush (a 2016 inductee into the Bass Fishing Hall of Fame) visited Scott’s homes in Montgomery and Pintlala, Alabama, where they fished on Scott’s well-stocked lakes. Bush later used the “bully pulpit” of the presidency to promote fishing and other forms of outdoor recreation, and he told the New York Times that his favorite periodical was Bassmaster Magazine.

Dedicated to boating safety, Scott began requiring contestants to wear life preservers any time their outboards were running, and he pushed to make the “kill switch” a standard safety feature on boats. He was instrumental in creation and passage of the Boating Safety Reform Act in 1994, which made Alabama among the first states to require boat operator certification. He was appointed to the National Boating Safety Advisory Council by then-President Jimmy Carter and was inducted into the Boating Safety Hall of Fame in 2002.

For those and many other achievements, Scott was listed — along with President Teddy Roosevelt, Rachel Carson and Aldo Leopold — by Field & Stream Magazine as one of 20 people who did the most to influence outdoor sports in the 20th Century. Outdoor Life named the formation of B.A.S.S. as one of the Top 10 fishing innovations of the past century.

He has received countless other awards for his achievements during his 50 years in the bass fishing industry, but one that may have meant the most to him was the Horatio Alger Award, which he received in 2003 for overcoming adversity to achieve the “American Dream.” Born during the height of the Depression, Scott’s father was a farm laborer and his mother was a hairdresser. He overcame poverty and a learning disability (dyslexia) to become, as biographer Boyle described him, “the man who woke the sleeping giant” of America’s sportfishermen.