In just a little more than a month, Alabama has lost a trio of outdoors icons. They are names that casual hunters and fishermen may have heard of, but not understood the role they played in the pursuits they love.

The passing of James “Big Daddy” Lawler affected me the most. As a shameless promoter of hunting, fishing, and conservation in the Black Belt, he was a frequent source in my stories over the past 35 years.

Big Daddy, as everyone called him, grew up in Wilcox County in the Grampian Hills of the Black Belt region. He showed up on my radar decades ago when he threw down the gauntlet and challenged the powers to be on Weiss Lake. His claim was that Millers Ferry Reservoir on the Alabama River was the real Crappie Capital of the World, a title Weiss Lake had bestowed on itself. He suggested a series of fishing tournaments to prove his point, but Weiss Lake proponents wisely refused to bite. Big Daddy had gotten the word out, and crappie fishing, and tourism, on Miller’s Ferry skyrocketed.