Team Rock On
09-02-2002, 07:11 PM
There is a big catch to this odd fish tale
By NEAL BUCCINO Staff Writer, (609) 272-7211, E-Mail
At the start of their most recent return to Atlantic City, Al McReynolds and his sons went fishing near the piers behind Harrah's Atlantic City.
McReynolds, 56, who holds the all-tackle world record for catching a 78-pound striped bass in 1982, stood over the ledge and looked into the water, which was about thigh-deep. While the evening tide came in he pointed at a cloud of tiny peanut bunker, barely visible beneath the surface.
The hundreds of fish churned in a figure eight, returning again and again to the same spot. McReynolds said they were in a panic, desperate to move but afraid to go too far because they could see what we couldn't - larger predatory fish, perhaps stripers, waiting in the dark.
The figure eight got tighter and the panicked fish whirled faster and faster, becoming a rippling blur and then an optical illusion. Quick flashes of moonlight sparked off their bellies here and there as individual fish turned slightly in the water.
The effect was, in a way, as dazzling and confusing as the strange things that happened after McReynolds caught his record striper from an Atlantic City pier Sept. 21, 1982.
Journey of a lifetime
McReynolds, an Atlantic City native, went from being a lifeguard and electrical inspector to a celebrity, to an outcast, to what he is now: a man who travels year-round with his wife and sons, living in hotel rooms and following striper and other fish migrations from Texas, along the Gulf and East Coasts to Maine and back, by car.
McReynolds, his wife, Karen, and their sons say it has been a great life. They say they travel not because they have to, but because "the catch" set them free to do what other fishermen only dream of doing.
But, 20 years after the big catch, the family still doesn't quite understand what happened to them.
Sons Al Jr., 23, and Tom, 21, can't imagine what life would be like without the record catch. They have grown into expert fishermen themselves and enjoy traveling. But, Tom said, "I don't have any childhood friends."
Al McReynolds plans to write a book called "The Day I Caught the Devil."
"It would be a warning, telling people what to do if you catch a world-record (fish), told by a man who received his world record and lived through the whole process," he said. "I used to say that if someone wrote a book, even a little paperback, about what to do if you win the lottery, it would be worth more than winning the lottery. What would you do?"
Catching Leviathan
Here is what happened that strange day, according to published accounts that McReynolds confirms are accurate:
A northeaster blew across the New Jersey shore, churning up waves and slamming baitfish into the rocks here. Most people weren't willing to fish in such terrible weather. But Al McReynolds and his friend Pat Erdman lived to fish. They knew that the little fish would attract bigger fish from out of the depths. Al knew the chances of breaking his personal record - a 39-pound striper - were good.
The men headed out to the Vermont Avenue rock jetty, on the street where McReynolds lived, in the wind and rain. Some waves were so high they broke over the jetty, up to the men's knees.
By 10 p.m., the men saw a huge tail flash out of the water. McReynolds braced himself and cast his line toward it. The fish bit.
Fishermen love stripers for their strength, tenacity and ability to break fishing lines. The challenge is exhilarating, especially for someone fishing from a beach or pier. You have to give them enough slack to tire themselves out. Some fights last a half-hour.
McReynolds' fight lasted an hour and 40 minutes. It was back- and arm-straining work on the slippery, storm-battered jetty. Finally, at about 11:40 p.m., the fish turned on its side and came closer. McReynolds reeled it in, nearly slipped and fell, and almost lost the fish on the jetty rocks.
The female fish was a monster, more than 4 feet long, with a head bigger than McReynolds' own and an eye as large as his nose. The distance from its dorsal fin to its belly matched the distance from nose to tail on an "average" striper.
McReynolds caught the fish with tackle that met International Game Fish Association standards, which meant it could be considered for an IGFA record. He needed to have it weighed and examined as quickly as possible. McReynolds and Erdman drove the fish to Campbell's Marine and Tackle on the Margate Bridge Causeway. They waited there until 7 a.m., when an employee opened the store.
Since then, McReynolds said, many people have challenged his record. Some said he bribed a commercial fisherman for the fish. Others said he stuffed it with lead weights. But the IGFA holds record fish to rigorous standards, and IGFA spokesman Doug Blodgett said this week that there is no controversy: McReynolds' fish was what he said it was.
McReynolds had to hand over the fish and his tackle for verification. Testing even included taking the fish to a doctor's office and having it X-rayed.
It wasn't until Christmas Eve that McReynolds finally got a call from the IGFA. The caller said the catch was acceptable, and McReynolds held the new world record.
Stranger than fiction
It was there that the weirdness began. McReynolds would have wanted to keep the fish, but was told it had been destroyed during testing. He suspects that it really was sold to some rich guy in Nebraska, and now is mounted in his den.
The New York Times called and said the Abu Garcia tackle company was offering a $250,000 reward to anyone who might catch a world-record striper that season. The offer was really a publicity stunt, and no one expected the company to have to pay, McReynolds said. Still, he gladly took the money.
Many friends and relatives are still close, and were happy for the family's success. But the big catch made some seem to lose their minds.
One relative physically attacked McReynolds. Someone - he suspects a relative - began sending anonymous letters to the IGFA, claiming McReynolds was a tax cheat and the catch was faked. Friends told him he wasn't welcome anymore. His union turned him down for job offers, "because they said I was a rich boy. I wasn't rich; I didn't have that money yet," McReynolds said.
Bait and tackle companies tried to get what they could out of him, including asking him to endorse products he knew nothing about. McReynolds wouldn't go into detail, but said his book would include hair-curling descriptions of what goes on in the fishing industry.
His family finally decided to use the money to travel to New Zealand, Hawaii, Australia and elsewhere. And they gave money to friends and relatives.
"I can't understand (when people say he squandered the money). This was found money. It wasn't saved or earned. If you wanted two lobster tails, you got two. If you wanted to get a $50 haircut instead of a $5 haircut, you got the $50. We did a great thing, man. We lived before we died. We discovered America. We lived a life that people only dream of," McReynolds said.
The family built a house in Massachusetts and settled into their current lifestyle: Traveling and fishing. They make a decent living at it, and have thousands of fish stories with striking photos to back them up.
And still, for reasons they do not understand, the family is hated in their hometown, and throughout the East Coast.
McReynolds and his sons competed last year in the Atlantic City/Atlantic County Surf Fishing Derby, winning 12 awards. People stalked them at night with binoculars. Someone said their domination of the contest "made good people upset."
Tom McReynolds remembers being in a restaurant with his father as a boy. Someone asked if his father was, in fact, the Al McReynolds. Tom said he was.
"Then some other guy came up and said, 'If you say you're the world record holder one more time, I'm gonna break your jaw,'" Tom said. "Whenever somebody gets close we have to be careful. We never know how they're gonna act."
Karen McReynolds feels she and Al did a good job raising their children under such bizarre circumstances. The hostility from "friends" and strangers nearly outweighs the good things their new life brought, but she focuses on the good.
"Whoopie Goldberg was in an interview, talking about how she would get together with her friends ... and talk about what they would do when she made it. Well, you know she did make it, and her friends don't talk to her anymore," Karen said.
The sequel
McReynolds' record striper was not the biggest one in the sea. Commercial fishers and government agencies have spotted or caught 90- and 100-pound stripers. Because those catches did not follow IGFA rules, however, McReynolds' record still stands. He predicts someone fishing from shore will break his record with "that triple-digit fish."
But McReynolds says he is onto something even better. Two years ago he and his sons spotted what they believe is a 150-pound striper in New Jersey waters.
The sighting happened while Tom was reeling in a 50-pound striper from a bridge. The spot of water was illuminated by a streetlight. Tom could clearly see his struggling fish ... "and then I stopped. They (Al and Al Jr.) said, 'What are you doing? Reel him in.' I just pointed," Tom said.
The huge fish swam by, and the men could not believe what they were seeing.
"It had to be twice as big as mine. It had eyes like oranges. Its tail had to be 3 feet long," Al McReynolds said.
Is this a fish story?
"I'm as sure as God gave me the (record) fish, it's true," McReynolds said.
They saw the fish again last year, and McReynolds wants to catch it.
"It has taken up residency in this area," he said. "The first thing you have to think about is what you'd use to catch it. My son said, 'Dad, we don't have tackle that could handle that. We don't have tackle that could catch a whale.' You'd need a boat. We would need big-game tuna rods that you would use for a marlin or a shark.
"If I could get somebody with a boat ..."
To e-mail Neal Buccino at The Press:
NBuccino@pressofac.com
By NEAL BUCCINO Staff Writer, (609) 272-7211, E-Mail
At the start of their most recent return to Atlantic City, Al McReynolds and his sons went fishing near the piers behind Harrah's Atlantic City.
McReynolds, 56, who holds the all-tackle world record for catching a 78-pound striped bass in 1982, stood over the ledge and looked into the water, which was about thigh-deep. While the evening tide came in he pointed at a cloud of tiny peanut bunker, barely visible beneath the surface.
The hundreds of fish churned in a figure eight, returning again and again to the same spot. McReynolds said they were in a panic, desperate to move but afraid to go too far because they could see what we couldn't - larger predatory fish, perhaps stripers, waiting in the dark.
The figure eight got tighter and the panicked fish whirled faster and faster, becoming a rippling blur and then an optical illusion. Quick flashes of moonlight sparked off their bellies here and there as individual fish turned slightly in the water.
The effect was, in a way, as dazzling and confusing as the strange things that happened after McReynolds caught his record striper from an Atlantic City pier Sept. 21, 1982.
Journey of a lifetime
McReynolds, an Atlantic City native, went from being a lifeguard and electrical inspector to a celebrity, to an outcast, to what he is now: a man who travels year-round with his wife and sons, living in hotel rooms and following striper and other fish migrations from Texas, along the Gulf and East Coasts to Maine and back, by car.
McReynolds, his wife, Karen, and their sons say it has been a great life. They say they travel not because they have to, but because "the catch" set them free to do what other fishermen only dream of doing.
But, 20 years after the big catch, the family still doesn't quite understand what happened to them.
Sons Al Jr., 23, and Tom, 21, can't imagine what life would be like without the record catch. They have grown into expert fishermen themselves and enjoy traveling. But, Tom said, "I don't have any childhood friends."
Al McReynolds plans to write a book called "The Day I Caught the Devil."
"It would be a warning, telling people what to do if you catch a world-record (fish), told by a man who received his world record and lived through the whole process," he said. "I used to say that if someone wrote a book, even a little paperback, about what to do if you win the lottery, it would be worth more than winning the lottery. What would you do?"
Catching Leviathan
Here is what happened that strange day, according to published accounts that McReynolds confirms are accurate:
A northeaster blew across the New Jersey shore, churning up waves and slamming baitfish into the rocks here. Most people weren't willing to fish in such terrible weather. But Al McReynolds and his friend Pat Erdman lived to fish. They knew that the little fish would attract bigger fish from out of the depths. Al knew the chances of breaking his personal record - a 39-pound striper - were good.
The men headed out to the Vermont Avenue rock jetty, on the street where McReynolds lived, in the wind and rain. Some waves were so high they broke over the jetty, up to the men's knees.
By 10 p.m., the men saw a huge tail flash out of the water. McReynolds braced himself and cast his line toward it. The fish bit.
Fishermen love stripers for their strength, tenacity and ability to break fishing lines. The challenge is exhilarating, especially for someone fishing from a beach or pier. You have to give them enough slack to tire themselves out. Some fights last a half-hour.
McReynolds' fight lasted an hour and 40 minutes. It was back- and arm-straining work on the slippery, storm-battered jetty. Finally, at about 11:40 p.m., the fish turned on its side and came closer. McReynolds reeled it in, nearly slipped and fell, and almost lost the fish on the jetty rocks.
The female fish was a monster, more than 4 feet long, with a head bigger than McReynolds' own and an eye as large as his nose. The distance from its dorsal fin to its belly matched the distance from nose to tail on an "average" striper.
McReynolds caught the fish with tackle that met International Game Fish Association standards, which meant it could be considered for an IGFA record. He needed to have it weighed and examined as quickly as possible. McReynolds and Erdman drove the fish to Campbell's Marine and Tackle on the Margate Bridge Causeway. They waited there until 7 a.m., when an employee opened the store.
Since then, McReynolds said, many people have challenged his record. Some said he bribed a commercial fisherman for the fish. Others said he stuffed it with lead weights. But the IGFA holds record fish to rigorous standards, and IGFA spokesman Doug Blodgett said this week that there is no controversy: McReynolds' fish was what he said it was.
McReynolds had to hand over the fish and his tackle for verification. Testing even included taking the fish to a doctor's office and having it X-rayed.
It wasn't until Christmas Eve that McReynolds finally got a call from the IGFA. The caller said the catch was acceptable, and McReynolds held the new world record.
Stranger than fiction
It was there that the weirdness began. McReynolds would have wanted to keep the fish, but was told it had been destroyed during testing. He suspects that it really was sold to some rich guy in Nebraska, and now is mounted in his den.
The New York Times called and said the Abu Garcia tackle company was offering a $250,000 reward to anyone who might catch a world-record striper that season. The offer was really a publicity stunt, and no one expected the company to have to pay, McReynolds said. Still, he gladly took the money.
Many friends and relatives are still close, and were happy for the family's success. But the big catch made some seem to lose their minds.
One relative physically attacked McReynolds. Someone - he suspects a relative - began sending anonymous letters to the IGFA, claiming McReynolds was a tax cheat and the catch was faked. Friends told him he wasn't welcome anymore. His union turned him down for job offers, "because they said I was a rich boy. I wasn't rich; I didn't have that money yet," McReynolds said.
Bait and tackle companies tried to get what they could out of him, including asking him to endorse products he knew nothing about. McReynolds wouldn't go into detail, but said his book would include hair-curling descriptions of what goes on in the fishing industry.
His family finally decided to use the money to travel to New Zealand, Hawaii, Australia and elsewhere. And they gave money to friends and relatives.
"I can't understand (when people say he squandered the money). This was found money. It wasn't saved or earned. If you wanted two lobster tails, you got two. If you wanted to get a $50 haircut instead of a $5 haircut, you got the $50. We did a great thing, man. We lived before we died. We discovered America. We lived a life that people only dream of," McReynolds said.
The family built a house in Massachusetts and settled into their current lifestyle: Traveling and fishing. They make a decent living at it, and have thousands of fish stories with striking photos to back them up.
And still, for reasons they do not understand, the family is hated in their hometown, and throughout the East Coast.
McReynolds and his sons competed last year in the Atlantic City/Atlantic County Surf Fishing Derby, winning 12 awards. People stalked them at night with binoculars. Someone said their domination of the contest "made good people upset."
Tom McReynolds remembers being in a restaurant with his father as a boy. Someone asked if his father was, in fact, the Al McReynolds. Tom said he was.
"Then some other guy came up and said, 'If you say you're the world record holder one more time, I'm gonna break your jaw,'" Tom said. "Whenever somebody gets close we have to be careful. We never know how they're gonna act."
Karen McReynolds feels she and Al did a good job raising their children under such bizarre circumstances. The hostility from "friends" and strangers nearly outweighs the good things their new life brought, but she focuses on the good.
"Whoopie Goldberg was in an interview, talking about how she would get together with her friends ... and talk about what they would do when she made it. Well, you know she did make it, and her friends don't talk to her anymore," Karen said.
The sequel
McReynolds' record striper was not the biggest one in the sea. Commercial fishers and government agencies have spotted or caught 90- and 100-pound stripers. Because those catches did not follow IGFA rules, however, McReynolds' record still stands. He predicts someone fishing from shore will break his record with "that triple-digit fish."
But McReynolds says he is onto something even better. Two years ago he and his sons spotted what they believe is a 150-pound striper in New Jersey waters.
The sighting happened while Tom was reeling in a 50-pound striper from a bridge. The spot of water was illuminated by a streetlight. Tom could clearly see his struggling fish ... "and then I stopped. They (Al and Al Jr.) said, 'What are you doing? Reel him in.' I just pointed," Tom said.
The huge fish swam by, and the men could not believe what they were seeing.
"It had to be twice as big as mine. It had eyes like oranges. Its tail had to be 3 feet long," Al McReynolds said.
Is this a fish story?
"I'm as sure as God gave me the (record) fish, it's true," McReynolds said.
They saw the fish again last year, and McReynolds wants to catch it.
"It has taken up residency in this area," he said. "The first thing you have to think about is what you'd use to catch it. My son said, 'Dad, we don't have tackle that could handle that. We don't have tackle that could catch a whale.' You'd need a boat. We would need big-game tuna rods that you would use for a marlin or a shark.
"If I could get somebody with a boat ..."
To e-mail Neal Buccino at The Press:
NBuccino@pressofac.com