LOWER RIVER

My grandfather, Jack Steketee, was the finest flyfisherman I have ever known. 

His rustic log cabin overlooked the Baldwin River in northern Michigan—just upstream from the Pere Marquette—where he tied flies, split wood and spent summer evenings hunting the river’s nocturnal brown trout.

He also tended to my grandmother, who was bedridden with rheumatoid arthritis, carrying her from resting spot to resting spot like a crippled songbird, so she could enjoy summer afternoons on the screened-in porch listening to the river, or reading the New York Times beneath a Hudson’s Bay blanket in front of the stone fireplace…

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