A History of Fishtrap

It was in the mid 1980s when Wallowa County bookstore owner Rich Wandschneider attended a Western writers conference in Portland, Oregon, but something didn’t feel quite right. Rich told conference organizer Kim Stafford that it seemed the event wasn’t really a gathering of writers of the West, but of Willamette Valley “I-5 writers.” Kim agreed, then issued a challenge: “Why don’t you host the next one in Wallowa County?” In 1988, Wandschneider, Stafford, and the award-winning journalist and historian, Alvin Josephy organized a gathering at Wallowa Lake with the theme “West Coast Writers and East Coast Publishers.” 

The Summer Fishtrap Gathering of Writers was born.

So began an annual tradition. Every July, readers, writers, journalists, historians, publishers, and lovers of the arts from all over the world gather at Wallowa Lake to write, to explore issues important to people of the West, and to make connections. The weeklong conference has provided hundreds of writers the opportunity to work with some of the best authors and teachers in the West including Ursula K. LeGuin, Luis Alberto Urrea, Bill Kittredge, Laura Pritchett, Anis Mojgani, Kathleen Dean Moore and many, many others.  

Over the years Fishtrap grew to add new programs like Winter Fishtrap, The Big Read, and the Outpost wilderness writing program. More recently, Fishtrap has expanded to include youth programming, the Fishtrap Fireside reading series, and several in-person and online workshops throughout the year. Fishtrap founders Rich Wandschneider and Kim Stafford continue to be closely associated with Fishtrap as Advisors and since 2015, Shannon McNerney has led the organization as Executive Director building on Fishtrap’s mission to “cultivate clear thinking and good writing in and about the West.”