133 ~ Of speckled trout and champagne

In early winter of 1936 Frank Lloyd Wright nearly died of pneumonia at Taliesin, his home near Spring Green, Wisconsin. It was touch and go for weeks, and when the fever finally broke, his relieved daughter Iovanna wrote to friends with the good news that her father was feeling better, and in fact had asked for a meal of “speckled trout and champagne”. “Speckled trout” is a common nickname for our beautiful native brook trout in Wisconsin, and it seems someone was catching brookies for Wright in the stream below the house, Lowery Creek.

The ensuing decades were not kind to Lowery Creek or its trout, and I recently had a chance to tell the inpirational story of the creek’s eventual restoration for the fall issue TROUT, the quarterly magazine of Trout Unlimited, in a piece titled “A Shining Success in Wisconsin”. If you like you can read the story here.

Share, leave a comment, or support - thank you!