Sport Fishing and Hunting Exhibit

The Sport Fishing and Hunting Exhibit The Port Aransas Preservation and Historical Association welcomes you to the Port Aransas Museum, and to the panels, objects, and displays of the sport fishing and hunting exhibit. Here is an overview of the exhibit, and a guideline for viewing it. There is commercial fishing, and there is sport fishing. The former is a marine industry geared to providing fish for myriad commercial purposes. Sport fishing, on the other hand, is about relaxation and fun—and sometimes even competition. The long panel above shows the six domains of sport fishing in this area. Commercial fishing Sport fishing While commercial fishing has had—and continues to have—a presence in Port Aransas, sport fishing is unquestionably king. Indeed, it is sport fishing that over a century ago provided the impetus for nothing less than tourism itself, the economic life blood of Port Aransas. The hunting aspect of the exhibit is about recreational (v. commercial—"market") duck hunting. Located in the central flyway, the flats and marshes around Port Aransas are the wintering grounds for untold rafts of redhead, pintail, and bluebill ducks (and others as well). That there is more "fishing" than "hunting" in this exhibit, reflects the greater economic and historical salience of fishing to this community. Market hunting A future recreational duck hunter dreams big! Our sport fishing and hunting histories, narrated and illustrated in chronological order, are presented in panels like this one. The panels begin to your immediate right, then around the second corner (by the hallway), down the long wall, and end on the wall behind you. A Fishing Paradise Found Timothy Vought was hired in 1875 to stay at the nearby The big revelation about Mustang Island fishing, lighthouse and do repair work. On his days off, Timothy, an avid however, began in 1880 when mainlanders arrived to fisherman, found himself in a virtual paradise: "I never saw fish construct the Aransas Pass jetties. These men noticed so thick." In fact, during his stay he took so many fish—mainly huge schools of tarpon in the pass. Because it fights redfish and black drum—that he wrote his wife, "Getting sick of so mightily when hooked, the tarpon is a prime sport the sight of fish." Vought's words (see below) are the first known fish. Soon the jetty people were paying islanders to descrip-tions of the extraordinary sport fishing in this area. row them to the pass to fish. "Fishing guide" became a vocation on Mustang Island, and the growing relevance of sport fishing to the local economy led to an 1886 hostelry being called the Tarpon Inn. A decade later, the town itself took “Tarpon” for its name. Constructing the jetties. Stellar fishing was first revealed close to the Guide rowing party in the Aransas Pass amid the jetty construction. Lydia Ann lighthouse. Constructing the jetties. The reputation of Tarpon, Texas, spread. Soon, a Mr. Ned Green came to fish the local waters. The tarpon so awed this Tarpon Club on San José Island, 1901. wealthy New Yorker, that by 1899 he had built a palatial structure on the tip of San José Island, just across the Aransas Pass from Tarpon. Green dubbed his creation the Tarpon Club, a member-ship venue where the standard was set by culinary dishes to satisfy even the keenest gourmet. Of course, members hired islanders as fishing and hunting (waterfowl) guides. The New York Times published articles about the Tarpon Club that brought even international attention to Mustang Island and its little com-munity of Tarpon. (The name “Port Aransas" was adopted in 1910.) Excerpts from Timothy Vought’s letters. Technology Aids the Guides A rowing guide and his party Some guides even sailed parties to the relax after landing a good tarpon grounds at the end of the jetties. Rowing or sailing parties to, and then around, the tarpon size tarpon. grounds, a distance exceeding four miles, was a tedious and laborious task for the guides. The advent of small powerboats after the turn of the 20th century greatly increased the efficiency of the guide business. Another fishing asset wrought by technology was the drag equipped reel. (Drag is tension on the fishing line needed to stop a fish from pulling out all the line.) On a drag equipped reel, line tension is increased or decreased simply by turning a little wheel. Before that innova-tion, amount of drag was physically managed by pressing one's thumb—protected by a leather flap—against the spool of line, an imprecise and fatiguing procedure. Early on, there were few powerboats available. Here (c. 1910), Ed Cotter shows the smart application of his powerboat by pulling 16 fishing boats to the tarpon grounds. (The famous Tarpon Inn is in the background.} The Port Aransas Boatmen Tarpon fishing in the Aransas Pass, which eventually expanded to bay and offshore fishing, created a number of boatmen and guides. In 1932, these individuals came together as the Port Aransas Boatmen’s Association to regulate the guide fee structure and to become involved in community projects. To finance such endeavors, the Boatmen organized fishing tournaments, the most famous being the Tarpon Rodeo and later the Deep Sea Roundup. A large and ambitious project was in 1949 when the Boatmen spearheaded the construction of the Community Center, which became the center of social life in Port Aransas— much as it is today. The Boatmen, now with the moniker Port Aransas Boatmen Inc., are still active. In addition to sponsoring the Deep Sea Roundup, they serve as consultants on the protection and conservation of saltwater fishing. And they also continue to be an important community asset; indeed, some of the Boatmen whose forefathers built the Community Center were involved in its massive 2009 renovation. “Court” of a Tarpon Rodeo tournament. Boatmen building the Community Center, 1949. Tournament class sailfish flanked by two fine tarpon. Those Fabulous Farley Boats Charles Frederick—Fred—Farley was a master craftsman. Based in Alabama, Fred worked the Gulf coast in the early 1900s repairing, designing, and building any number of things: wharves, lighthouses, utility boats…even ornate saloon bar tops. Fred’s brother Jim had moved to Port Aransas, from which he sent Fred word that the fishing guides in this "world headquarters of tarpon fishing" were looking for well designed, fairly priced powerboats to practice their trade more proficiently. Sensing an economic opportunity, Fred Farley came to town in 1915 to build boats. Built initially from top-grade cypress —and later select Honduran and Philippine mahogany, the Farley and Sons Boat Works turned out the Cadillacs of coastal fishing boats. In addition to the aesthetic Farley lines, no boat handled this area's incessantly choppy water better than a Farley; and the Farley freeboard—side height—was just right to allow guides to boat their catches safely and efficiently. Farley boats were built from sketches drawn on the Guides wharf and the factory floor. omnipotent Farley boats. Farley boats were known for smoothing out choppy water. The most historic VIP to go aboard a Farley boat was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Farley boats were not “cookie cut” nor built from traditional marine architectural plans. After listening to the customer's specifications, Fred Farley drew the corresponding craft on the floor of the shop and then worked from that rendering— the "computer" was in the heads of this skilled craftsman and the people he trained. After six decades of premier boat building, the Farley Inside the Farley Boat Works.The sleek hull is of a craft built operation ceased in 1975. for a member of the Borden dairy dynasty. Tarpon Rodeo Barney Farley, a Port Aransas businessman and The gunshot brought a “Keystone Boatman, and Fred Kinsolving, a Corpus cops” departure from the dock. newspaper man, realized a way for Port Aransas to capitalize on the great popularity of tarpon Barney Farley’s fishing. revolver started the Tarpon Rodeo. Barney and Fred organized and staged a competitive tarpon fishing tournament based in Port Aransas. The money from the competitors' entry fees was used to fund community projects. The Tarpon Rodeo tourna-ment began in 1932, making it the first fishing tournament on the Texas coast. The tournament involved the whole town. This tail walker, and the leaper below, show Regretfully, the tarpon began leaving why the tarpon, the “silver king,” is a premier area waters some time after World War sport fish. II. There are various hypothesis of why that happened, among them being natural migration and the Mexicans dynamiting close by tarpon waters to gather fish as fodder for their fertilizer plants. So spotty did the once world class tarpon fishing become, that the Tarpon Rodeo was dissolved after the 1958 tournament. Happily, there has been a recent resurgence of tarpon, the fishing for which is now strictly on a catch-and-release basis. Just holding the Tarpon Rodeo tournament trophy brings a big smile. President Roosevelt Comes to Port Aransas In the heyday of the tarpon era, Franklin Delano Roosevelt came here to fish. While the President could have learned about little Port A through the sports media, FDR had a much more personal connection to the town: His son Elliott had tarpon Elliott Roosevelt (left) had discovered fished here and gave his father a glowing report. In short order, the President, an avid fisherman, laid plans to fish the Port A’s world class tarpon fishing. waters of Port Aransas, Texas. On 29 April 1937, the President and his party left New Orleans aboard the destroyer USS Moffet (escorted by another destroyer, USS Decatur.) The President's ship arrived and stood off the Aransas Pass on May 1st.

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