TCO State College: Steve Atanasio

When did you start working at TCO?

 Started at State College store in 2010 I believe.

What is your favorite place you have fly fished? (Near or Far) 

Without question my favorite place  to fish is a certain tributary of Lake Erie. Unfortunately if I name it, I could meet an untimely demise. Oh, and then there is the Yellowstone R. that place is trout fisherman's Nirvana.

What music is being played on your way to the stream?

Its a little dark, however every steel-head trip requires a rendition of  " Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."  After that its anything from Otis Redding to The Eagles and Springsteen.

Steve's Bio

Born and raised on Long Island into an extended family that loved to fish. Dad, uncles, cousins, even aunt May could drift a" shiner" for fluke with the best of us! My angling evolution of course revolved around salt water.  By the time I had been through school and was suspected of being an "adult" I was driving from one end of the Island to the other chasing Stripers,Weakfish, and Blues with tin spoons and plugs. Relocation's from LI to Baltimore to State College put  me on a collision course with the "Dark Side". Flyfishing.

A career in transportation logistics and raising a family shut down most travel back to LI. And with new friends an neighbors being fly fisherman, I succumbed. "When in Rome"

Twenty five years later with 50 hour work weeks  in the rear view mirror, family grown and on cruise control. I love to spend as much time and money Steelheading as possible. Trout are great to fill in the void between spring steelhead and fall steelhead. But when I dream its not of dry fly fishing Penn's during the Drake hatch.  
Warm, pleasant early summer evenings. I envision steelheading in November, on cold, snotty days. Occasionally in PNW but mostly on a Great Lake tributary.

Remember "there's no fiss like Mykiss"