Capt. Skip James Passes Away

Longtime Sabine Lake guide Capt. Skip James has passed away.

James was well-known for being a flounder specialist and for his seminars and appearances at sports shows throughout Texas and Louisiana.

He famously displayed a replica of the Texas state record flounder at his booths and would often refer to southern flounder by their Latin name-Paraliicthys lethostimga.

He was the star of a top-selling how-to VHS called Flounder Tactics put out by Texas outdoors television icon Keith Warren in the late 1990s and early in his career worked with the founders of In-Fisherman in Minnessotta.

Most importantly Skip James was a husband, father, grandfather and a friend.

He was a dear friend to me and an early mentor.

He freely shared information on the ins and outs of the outdoor business that put me ahead of the game. Without Skip James there is no Chester Moore as the public knows me.

He had that big of a positive impact.

I was loyal to Skip during his challenging times and Skip was always there for me behind the scenes and would show up in the middle of the night to help me or my family if needed.

Skip and I become friends because of our love for flounder and concerns about their population. I started writing about them intensely around 1995, and he had started lobbying for flounder conservation.

He and his clients certainly kept their legal limits of flounder when they caught them but when bag limits decreased in Texas and in Louisiana he was glad.

“I can get clients who want limits what they want easier, if the limits are smaller” he would say and then burst into this trademark laughter.

Skip was the man who helped guide my early goals to help flounder and for that I honor him. He is still by far the greatest flounder fisherman I have ever met.

When pondering my relationship with Skip, I think about a scene in the western classic—Tombstone.

After a harrowing shoot-out that involved incredible heroics by Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday who had tuberculosis starts violently coughing.

“You ought to be in bed Doc,” said one of his compadres.

“Wyatt Earp is my friend,” Holliday said implying he was sticking by Earp’s side until the end.

“I’ve got lots of friends,” the compadre said.

“I don’t,” Holliday said.

That’s how I felt about Skip.

I had the honor and privilege of visiting Skip the day before he passed and although his speech was limited, we communicated about Jesus Christ and I got to let him know what he meant to me.

And of course Paralicthys lethostigma was discussed.

Goodbye Skip.

I’ll see you when the trumpet sounds and the Lord calls us all home. If there are flounder in Heaven, I bet you’ve already caught a bunch.

Chester Moore