JIM ADAMS

This professional fishery biologist has an unmatched passion for fly-fishing and its techniques, history and gear. As a biologist, Adams supervised 80 scientists for the benefit of trout streams in California, and he led the pioneering study that transformed Hat Creek into a wild trout stream. He's fished in 14 states, 10 other American countries and provinces, nine European countries, and a few South Pacific venues, mainly New Zealand. Among other things, Adams is credited with inventing methods for catching giant salmon on fly-fishing gear in the deep waters of the Smith River, and he was a contemporary of Bill Schaadt and others featured in the recent film "Rivers of a Lost Coast." He teaches Rocky Mountain summer classes in fly-fishing entomology, and in retirement he fishes 180 days a year and runs a worldwide business selling secondhand books and angling gear to collectors. Named on 65 percent of ballots.

Inducted posthumously: Frederick Law Olmsted, the father of American landscape architecture and parks; Bill Schaadt, one of the world's top fly-fishers.