Au Sable River Words

Eventually all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. — Norman MacLean, A River Runs Through It

In hopes of unearthing a budding writer who hears the river's words, the Anglers of the Au Sable are planning to resume the writing contest abandoned in 1990. In that year, students from Grayling High School competed with essays and poems. Those that rose to the top received fly fishing outfits presented at the Federation of Fly Fishers Conclave in June of 1991. With some experience under our belts from that contest and new enthusiasm to discover gifted writers, we are moving forward with an expanded contest. Our first expansion will be in the category of "Who?" Rather than including only Grayling High School students, this year's contest will include students from Mio-Au Sable and Oscoda high schools. Since many of us consider the Au Sable River as a river system that flows below the Mio impoundment, the inclusion of the schools downstream seemed like a natural extension. As before, the students involved in the competition will be enrolled in the eleventh and twelfth grades.

Our second expansion will be in genre. Instead of having one category, we will expand the contest to include three: fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Rather than judging all three forms of writing in one category, it was felt the separation would encourage more entries and possibly more participants.

The rules for the contest will be fairly straightforward. As stated before, the participants must be enrolled at one of the high schools along the Au Sable River corridor and must be in the eleventh or twelfth grade. The theme of the contest will be Au Sable River Words. Fiction will be limited to 2,000 words or less. The non-fiction category, in which we hope to get conservation reflections, essays, and/or reporting, will have the same limitation. Poetry will be limited to 500 words or less. Originality will be a primary objective, but organization, style, and the conventions of writing will also be noted.

The contest will run from the beginning of February to the beginning of April. Our hope is that by having the competition at that time, students who must take the Michigan Educational Assessment Program (MEAP) test will be encouraged to fulfill the test requirements, while at the same time compete for prizes with the Anglers. The MEAP test officials require that students have two samples of their writing with them when they are assessed in late spring.

Awards will be given for all three categories. Each participating school will receive a plaque engraved with the name(s) of the school's first place winner(s). The plaques will remain on display in the schools so that future winners' names can be engraved. As before, the winners will be brought to the Federation of Fly Fishers Conclave in June, 1999 at the McMullan Center on Higgins Lake and will receive their awards at that time. RWOL

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