Nebraskaland

34 Nebraskaland • May 2025 very sensitive." Gray has been fi shing with Live Well. Go Fish. since 2021. "I love to be on boats," she said. "The fi shing is pretty fun. I absolutely love this program." Honoring Veterans Veterans are a big part of Live Well. Go Fish. The American fl ag always fl ies from the back of the boat. There are days set aside to honor those who have served in diff erent wars, including the Women's Army Corps. Rudder didn't serve but had uncles who did, including one who died in Korea. He and the volunteers appreciate those who did, and the freedom they fought to defend. "We wouldn't be doing this without them," he said. The group works with veterans homes, county veterans' services offi ces, nonprofi ts and hospice groups that work with veterans, VFW and American Legion clubs, and Women's and Family auxiliary groups. Rudder is still amazed by the group of four World War II veterans they hosted on D-Day in 2018. On the boat was a soldier who landed on Normandy Beach in France and then marched into Berlin, another who worked undercover as a spy in a German concentration camp, and one who helped liberate those camps. Some of the Live Well. Go Fish. volunteers are veterans who enjoy working with veterans. Better able to relate to each other, guides and passengers are apt to open up and share stories they might not share with others. The Volunteers Rudder is the only paid member of Live Well. Go Fish. Helping him are 48 volunteers, who come from as far away as Nebraska City and West Point and last year donated nearly 1,500 hours of their time to the program. "This program works because of the volunteers," Rudder said. "You see them catch a fi sh and they hand the rod to somebody. They're not in it for themselves." Tom Lanz is a longtime volunteer hunter education instructor for the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission and has mentored many young hunters and anglers. He often saw Rudder and the Live Well. Go Fish. boat when he was fi shing at Lake Wanahoo. After learning what the group was about, he told Rudder he would be happy to help if they ever needed him. He's now a member of the board of directors. "I'll tell you what, it's about as rewarding as anything you can do," Lanz said. "Everybody does a lot of things for kids, and that's the future of hunting and fi shing. But there's a little bit of payback for a lot of these elderly people and the people who can't get out." It brings things full-circle Lanz said, just as taking his elderly grandfather fi shing decades after he taught him to hunt and fi sh did. Charli Saltzman, above, a counselor with the Nebraska Commission for the Blind and Visually Impaired, holds and feels a bluegill she caught. Below, Makenzie Gray, a participant in commission programs, lets a nightcrawler slither across her hand, giving a play-by-play of what she was feeling as it did.

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