 Beginning with "Blue", a "blue belton" with Llewellyn and George's Ryman's Sir Roger DeCoverley blood, and "Dawn", an "orange belton" contributing a mixture of English dual bench and field blood that Evans' father had found in Pittsburgh, Evans started his breeding program.The first brood of nine puppies has proven to be the beginning of a long line of prized bird dogs, continued through line breeding.After he returned to West Virginia at the end of World War II, as the magazine industry turned more towards photography, Evans found less and less work illustrating magazine stories.