112 MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 



Stream. After these meetings, when Ira and I got to talk- 

 ing over old times and swapping army experiences, some- 

 thing always happened to interrupt, and the loss cannot 

 be repaired. 



At the tournaments in Central Park it was a common 

 remark how Ira was always on the casting platform un- 

 tangling the lines, tying on flies and helping the men who 

 were in the contest against him; a course so opposite to 

 that of the "mug hunters," which the lax rules of the As- 

 sociation encouraged to enter the lists, that it could not 

 have passed unnoticed. Unconsciously the subject of 

 this sketch was exposing himself and his great, kind heart 

 to the public, and, worst of all, to one who in later years 

 chose to write him up and show him by lime-light on the 

 great curtain of Forest and Stream. 



In 1885, after I had begun the stocking of the Hudson 

 River with salmon, Ira organized the Eastern New York 

 Fish and Game Protective Association, which still exists. 

 Under date of November 18, 1885, he wrote me: "I have 

 set on foot a plan for forming a club or society, to be com- 

 posed of the best men in this city (Albany), to care for the 

 salmon which you have planted in the Hudson, and also 

 to protect all other fish and game in this region." 



In this imperfect sketch I have been greatly assisted 

 by Mr. William Allen Butler, of Syracuse, N. Y., in gath- 

 ering facts concerning Ira's life in that city. He tells me 

 that "Captain Wood came of good old New England 

 stock, being a descendant of Dr. Samuel Wood, who 

 came from England in 1684, and was one of the first set- 

 tlers of Danbury, Conn., in 1696. His mother was a 

 Breed, and her father, with three brothers and their father, 

 fought in the battle of Bunker Hill on their own farm; 

 their ancestor, Allan Breed, having emigrated from Eng- 

 land in 1630 with Governor Winthrop and the Puritans." 



