From the top bunk of a bed, in the half-darkness of a tiny childhood nightlight, Sheridan Anderson hears his little brother, Mike, whisper up to him, “Tell me a story.” There’s an easel in the shadows. “Sherry” starts talking from an imagination somehow wider than the boundaries of a ten-year-old mind, spinning tales about characters from his daytime doodles. That his dominant protagonist is a balloon called The Creep doesn’t matter—what matters is that the imagination and the doodles formed the genesis for the greatest instructional fly-fishing book of all time.

Browse the fishing section of any chain bookstore and there are enough how-to titles to fill an entire shelf. There’s The Everything Fishing Book, Fly Fishing for Dummies, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fly Fishing, Fly Fishing Made Easy. There’s The Essential Guide to Fly-Fishing, The Simple Art of Fly-Fishing, and The Ultimate Book of Fly-Fishing. But none have endured—and been cherished—like Sheridan Anderson’s Curtis Creek Manifesto. Almost every fly fisherman has it, knows it, or has recommended it. Its humor, illustrations, and touches of randomness are unique in the literature of the sport. If a fishing book sells a couple thousand copies, it’s considered a success. The Manifesto has sold a quarter of a million.