Our featured Angler for March is the federation's Tournament Director Alton Vaughn

by Peter Robbins
(Who is Pete Robbins & What else has he written?)

Alton Vaughn with his wife and grandson

Every year, Alton Vaughn goes to both Chapter Teams Tournaments, the Mr. B.A.S.S. Tournament, and the Fall Classic, but he doesn’t make a single cast. While attending those state championship events, he works tirelessly from long before daylight until hours after the vast majority of the sun, wind and rain wearied anglers are asleep. They don’t pay him to serve as Virginia B.A.S.S. Federation Tournament Director, and he has to use valuable vacation time to work the tournaments. All of this begs the simple question….WHY?

“I take great satisfaction when a tournament runs smoothly,” Vaughn says. “There were lots of headaches in the old days.” Vaughn admits that sometimes he misses fishing the events, but notes that “I still get my fishing in, mostly in club tournaments.”

Federation Roots
Alton Vaughn was born in 1943 in Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, and spent his formative years in that same state. He was a self-described “farm boy” who grew up hunting and fishing whenever he could. Some of his earliest memories involve taking a straight pin and some twine that his grandmother gave him and heading to the nearest creek to catch “horny heads, brim, whatever would bite.”

After marrying Sandra, his wife of forty years, Alton moved to Hopewell, Virginia. At his brother-in-law’s insistence, he joined the Bass Anglers Sportsmans Society, and they and two friends formed a bass club.

After operating independently for a short period of time, Alton and friends decided to affiliate their club with the nascent B.A.S.S. Federation program. He believes that they were approximately the thirtieth such club in the nation.

Early Problems with the Federation
Although Alton’s club voluntarily joined the Federation, they did so uneasily. Through the grapevine, they had “heard bad things about how the tournaments were run.”

Their fears were realized when the attended the Chapter Teams Tournament. “We got to the meeting at 5 o’clock,” he says, “and if we were lucky we’d be paired up by eleven.” Additionally, the infrastructure of officials who keep the organization running was not formalized. “We didn’t hardly have a Board then,” Alton remembers.

While some members of the club considered ending their relationship with the Federation, Alton thought that the Federation, with proper changes in management and organization, had a lot to offer.

Stepping Up to the Plate
Alton realized that although the early Federation events were somewhat disorganized, with a little bit of effort they could be a model of efficiency. “Fishermen are basically good people who will do what you say,” he says, “and we had a large number of good people willing to work the tournaments.”

He quickly decided that wherever there was a need, he would be there. As he does today, Alton would show up at state-level tournaments around noon on Thursday, where he’d fill whatever role was necessary. His responsibilities included inspecting boats, putting up sponsor banners, driving the pontoon, and measuring and weighing in fish.

Former tournament director Pee Wee Powers, who now works the professional level B.A.S.S. Tournaments noticed Alton’s devotion – and late hours – and when Pee Wee moved on he bequeathed his responsibilities to his logical successor.

Once at a tournament, it’s rare that Alton will get a complete night of sleep. “People call at all hours,” he says. “Sometimes they tell me that a club member is sick or things like that,” and he has to be able to make quick and fair decisions…even when he’s groggy.

Hard Decisions
In his years as tournament director, Alton remembers a great many situations in which he has had to make difficult decisions. He has had to disqualify members of his own club for rules infractions. Similarly, one year at the Chapter Teams tournament, he had to disqualify a club from his own region; they had failed to register on time.

Alton doesn’t believe that fishermen are a dishonest group, but notes that the stress of competition, combined with fatigue, can cause anglers to make bad decisions. For example, he notes that most of the time “when someone weighs in a short fish they don’t do it deliberately.”

He adds that whenever he disqualifies or otherwise penalizes and individual or club “they gripe and complain, but usually by the next day they apologize.”

Reflecting on the Past and Looking to the Future
Having examined the operations of several other state federations and other tournament organizations, Alton is justifiably proud of what Virginia has accomplished. “With the Federation we’ve got, and the tournament committee we’ve got, no one runs tournaments better than us.”

He states that the Federation’s success is most reflective of its willingness to evolve. “We don’t make the same mistake twice,” he says. “If we have a problem, we learn from our experience.”

When asked what the fishermen could do better, Alton states that although there are “no major problems,” perhaps the lines of communication between anglers and their club and region representatives should be more open. “They need to ask the officials more questions about registration information and those types of things,” he says.

For the future, Alton intends to “stay where I’m at until I’m too old to do it anymore.” He does plan, however, to fish a little more, in particular with his four children and eight grandchildren, but insists that this is not mutually exclusive with his tournament duties. He apparently derives the same satisfaction from a blemish-free tournament that many others derive from catching a big limit of fish on tournament day. Without volunteering tournament officials like Alton, however, there would be no Federation events in which to weigh in those fish.

If you would like to contact Alton, he can be e-mailed at toon2bassfish@aol.com In the alternative, just wait until the next time you’re lucky enough to qualify for one of the state-level tournaments. He’ll be there when you get your boat checked, go to the partner draw, and, if you’re lucky, when you weigh in that winning limit of fish.