Judging Bassmaster By Its Cover

If you've been reading Bassmaster Magazine for very long, you've seen a lot of different looks, a lot of anglers and a lot of bass.

The very first issue of Bassmaster came out in the spring of 1968 and featured Jimmy Holt on the cover. Holt was the longtime host of The Tennessee Outdoorsman television show and an important member of the media spreading the word about BASS and bass fishing in the early days. After all, the first issue couldn't feature a photo of a fishing star. There were no fishing stars. It would take Bassmaster Magazine to create them.

Ever wonder who's been on more Bassmaster covers than anyone else? The answer won't surprise you. It's Ray Scott, who's been on 15 covers over the years, sometimes as the focal point but often in a supporting role as he stands with a Bassmaster Classic winner or other tournament champion.

Among professional anglers, three men have been featured on the cover eight times. Two of them won't surprise you a bit, but the other might. With four Bassmaster Classic titles to his credit, Rick Clunn is a natural as a cover choice. The same is true for two-time Classic champ and three-time Bassmaster Angler of the Year Kevin VanDam. Those guys are obvious picks, but did you know that Davy Hite is the other eight-time cover boy?

Two U.S. presidents have made the cover of Bassmaster, though neither was in office at the time of the publication.

George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton shared the weigh-in stage with Clunn and Scott when Clunn won the 1984 Bassmaster Classic on the Arkansas River. At the time, Bush was vice president under Ronald Reagan and Clinton was the governor of Arkansas. Bush was featured on the November/December 1984 cover and both commanders in chief made the cover of the 1990 Bassmaster Classic Report.

Only one Bassmaster Angler of the Year has never appeared on the cover of Bassmaster Magazine. That would be fishing superstar Jimmy Houston, who won the award twice, in 1976 and 1986. Likewise, only one Classic champ failed to make the cover. Charlie Reed won fishing's biggest tournament in 1986, but never got the cover.

There have been a few fathers and sons featured on the cover, but only twice have the father and son been pictured together. That happened in April 1983 with Gary and John Diamond and again in December 1999 when Bernie and Trevor Schultz graced the cover.

No one has taken more Bassmaster cover photos than BASS' own Gerald Crawford. The BASS photography manager has taken 40 cover shots since 1981. But not all Bassmaster covers use photographs. Dozens have used illustrations, and the illustrator most often featured has been Chris Armstrong, who has eight covers to his credit

Only one man has both taken a photo that ran on the cover of Bassmaster and done a cover illustration. That was Cliff Shelby, the talented artist who draws Harry 'N' Charlie each month and who was the inspiration for the Charlie character.

The Bass Professor, Doug Hannon, is the only man to have both appeared on the cover of Bassmaster Magazine and taken a cover photo. Herb Reed not only invented the Slug-Go, launching the soft plastic jerkbait craze, he also illustrated three Bassmaster covers in the mid-1980s. Now that's talent!

When Pam Martin-Wells made the cover of the April 2007 Bassmaster, it created quite a buzz. But she wasn't the first woman on the cover — not by a long shot. That honor goes to Dema Martin, wife of 1974 Classic Champ Tommy Martin, who was pictured alongside her husband in a small inset photo on the cover of the February 1975 issue. A woman would not be the focal point of a Bassmaster cover for three more years. In the July/August 1978 issue, an unidentified woman wearing sunglasses became BASS' first "cover girl." (Call us if you know who she is!)

In all, 11 women have appeared on the cover of the magazine.

BASS staffers have been infrequent cover models over the years. Longtime Tournament Director Harold Sharp was part of three covers, but never the focal point of the image. Similarly, his successor, Dewey Kendrick, was part of a cover following the 1989 Classic.

Dave Ellison was the first BASS employee to get the full glare of the cover, but he was masked for the shot. For the November/December 1977 issue, Ellison donned a ski mask and stepped into a deep freeze for a cover photo on cold-weather fishing. More recently, tournament assistant Pee Wee Powers helped to hold up Dean Rojas' record 45-pound, 2-ounce five-bass limit on the April 2001 issue, Tournament Manager Chuck Harbin went along for a ride in a Triton boat on the January 2006 cover, and longtime Bassmaster Editor Dave Precht fought a lunker largemouth on the June 2007 cover.

Did you know that every Bassmaster cover but one has been in full color? The only black-and-white cover ever issued came in September 2005 when we ran a 1934 photo of largemouth bass world record holder George Perry. And while fish and fishermen have been the rightful focus of covers over the years, in May/June 1978, the cover illustration depicted a poacher to go along with a feature on how lawbreakers were damaging our resources.

So you don't have to catch a big bass to make the cover of Bassmaster, but it definitely doesn't hurt. The biggest bass ever to appear on the cover was none other than the heaviest largemouth ever recorded, Mac Weakley's 25-pound, 1-ounce giant caught in 2006. It was featured on the May 2006 cover. Ironically, the same bass may have been featured on the cover of the June 2001 issue when it weighed 20-12 and had been caught by Mike Long.

The only world record fish ever to appear on the cover was the top spotted bass back in the fall of 1968. That record has been eclipsed several times since.

So who's going to get the next cover of fishing's best-selling and most honored magazine? You'll just have to stay tuned for that.







OOPS
The covers of the February 1987 adn July/August 1989 issues featured almost identical photos.

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