The spring of 1969 was one of the best ever, light winds and rising water temperatures had caused the pelagic species of fish, among them king and Spanish mackerel, cobia, or ling and dolphin, or dorado, to move in early and by the end of April were in abundance. The light winds and calm seas had lured us down to the Galveston Jetties, my favorite spot at the south jetty in particular, for this Saturday mornings go at some of our finny friends.

As the sun peeked over the eastern horizon, Brad, just turned 8, Dub Middleton, a close friend and I were cutting around the end of the jetty on our way to our spot. We pulled up and anchored and congratulated ourselves for beating the Saturday crowd. Getting a shrimp out to bait Brad’s line, I noticed a boat that pulled up within 75 feet of us and it was a friend, Wayne Thomas, guiding today and had 2 clients with him. Waving to him while Brad cast toward the jetty, before the bait could sink, a spec nailed it right on the surface.

Landing Brad’s fish, Dub let me know he was into a nice one too and soon I netted a 3, pound, trout for him. Baiting up Brad, he cast out toward the rocks and had another savage strike, this one not coming in easy and proved to be a nice red fish, another 3 pounder. Wayne yelled over from his boat, “Jon, you’d better get to fishing or that boy is going to catch all of the fish.”

Heeding his instructions, my cast looped out to almost the rocks and as soon as the shrimp hit the water, something good size hit it and took off for Mexico! A long run down the jetty, a couple of jumps and several swirls around the boat showed that this was a keeper ling. We didn’t think the net would be big enough, but we finally man handled the ling into the boat, whacked it on the head and put it in the cooler, probably a 36 incher, then I turned my attention back to Brad.

After I baited him up for his 3rd cast, I turned around to get me another shrimp when I heard him exclaim, “Dad!” As I turned, I saw his rod and reel leaving his hands and come bouncing back towards me in the back of the boat. My natural reaction was to quickly move 2 steps to my right, scoop up the rod and reel and hand it back to Brad, all the while his fish, a flounder, was still pulling and fighting. Dub was laughing, Wayne and his clients were laughing, as he yelled over, “Nice stop! I see you still have good hands!” Not thinking this was too funny, I landed Brads flounder, a 2 pounder and we all went back to fishing, ending the day with the nice ling, 16 specs and reds and 1 flounder.

In the spring of 1966, severe flooding over the headwaters of the Trinity and San Jacinto Rivers and Buffalo Bayou had flushed out Galveston Bay.  The bay was fresh and muddy and almost all of the baitfish had departed and taken up residence along the beachfront and the Galveston Jetties.  The trout and reds quickly followed presenting a real opportunity to catch some fish and try out my new boat, a 16foot, semi-v, with a internal bait well (this was a real big deal back then), pushed by a 75 horse outboard.  This boat was a great step forward from my last, a 14, footer.

So that I could make my afternoon appointments, this particular day in early May, 1966, my dad and I had decided to sneak off early in the morning, fish our South Jetty spot and be back in town by 10:00 AM.  Dad was retired, never missed a chance to go fishing and, unlike me, had no schedules pressing on him.

We bought a quart of shrimp, put it in the internal bait well, then launched at Bobby Wilson’s Bait Camp and sped at 35, miles per hour around the east beach flats, not there anymore since a hurricane rearranged the landscape around the end of Galveston Island.  With one exception, now that I owned a jetty worthy boat there would be no more wading for us, the exception being only if it was too rough to get around the end of the South Jetty, we would wade.  No problem today since the wind was blowing lightly out of the northeast.

Just after sunrise we motored up and slipped close to the jetty, quietly dropping the anchor, letting out some line until the anchor caught.  Looking up and down the jetty, we were the only boat out.  We ended up 35 or 40, feet from the rocks, in 10 feet of water.  The depth dropped from 0 to 10, feet in 40, feet!  The tide was flowing to our left toward the beach and it’s funny that when the tide is flowing out of the channel, you get a reverse effect on the gulf side of both jetties.  We could see the baitfish crowded against the rocks and we knew the trout were here!

Dad had a new, red reel with 15, pound line, mounted on a 6-1/2, foot, fiberglass, popping rod, just the right tackle.  Using a spinning reel, 10, pound line with a semi-stiff, 6-1/2, foot, spinning rod, I would be Ok unless I picked up a big red or a jackfish.  We were free shrimping with a BB size split shot attached about 10 inches above a small, treble hook.  Trout poison!  For the record we had 2 coolers, foam for food and drinks and a new 48, quart Igloo for the fish.  Funny thing, at that time, Igloo was one of my computer customers and my afternoon appointment was with them.

We baited up, cast toward the rocks, drug the shrimp slowly along the drop off and whamo, whamo, we were both into 2 very nice fish.  We began the “West Bay Shuffle”, circling around the boat, passing rods under each other to prevent tangling, all while keeping pressure on the fish and these were good ‘uns!  We netted both fish in the same landing net, removed the hooks, placed them in the new 48, quart cooler and the fish were identical, 26, long, 5 pounders, with their tails curling up the side if the cooler.

We shook hands, baited up and cast out and whamo, whamo, 2 more nice fish and this was repeated over and over until we had the cooler full to the top with a minimum of ice sprinkled on the fish!   Our total was 29 specs, 25 to 27, inches long, almost 200, pounds of trout and all of this in less than 2 hours!

We sold 25 of the trout, keeping 4 for us to eat and here’s my dad with the 4.

Looking up, I saw Wayne Thomas, a real jetty pro, and one of my old college and baseball playing buddies, pulling up slowly outside of us.  Yelling across the water, “Wayne, let me pull up the anchor then you ease in here.  There’s still plenty of specs around and you all can catch some fish.”

In the next day’s Houston Chronicle, Bob Brister, the Outdoor Editor, wrote that the jetty pros hammered the trout at the NORTH Jetty, looks like I made the team!  Funny, I guess he really could keep a secret?

My last attempt at fly-fishing was in the spring of 1969 at our hunting/fishing lease south of Danbury. My boat was in the shop so my dad, Lloyd Weston, my pastor and I left our southwest Houston homes before sunup and headed down to the lease. On our way down we had decided that Dad and Lloyd would fish out of a skiff and me, since I was using the fly rod, for the other fisherman’s safety, would wade.

Just as the sun was coming up, Dad and Lloyd pushed off in the skiff and started casting back toward the bank and dragging their lures off the drop off in the channel. For me, I only needed a skiff to get across the channel, and once across, after dropping the skiff’s anchor, hopped out into the thigh deep water and began laboring to cast out my small, fluorescent green, popper.

Several false casts later success was mine as the popper quietly dropped on to the surface beside one of the several duck blinds in the reservoir. As the popper lay still on the water and the rings had subsided, with my left hand, I twitched it 1 time and it was engulfed by a bass, not big, 13 or 14 inches, but I let it run around some and after several jumps, stripped in the line and slid my fingers into the bass’ mouth. This was a keeper so I slipped it on the stringer and continued my casting theatrics.

Ever now and then I would hear a holler from the other skiff as one of the guys had a strike and from the sounds they had already bagged several, but I continued my labored casting. Soon, my green popper settled beside a clump of grass and was immediately struck by a no nonsense, bass. This one took of on a run, jumped several times, stubbornly fought the rod and finally I lipped it and slid it, by my estimate a four pounder, on to the stringer, 2 nice keepers so far this morning!

As the morning wore on and the sun rose in the sky, the heat turned up and I’m sure the bass that had been on the flats moved into the deeper water of the channel. Moving toward the deeper water, more casts, nothing bothered my popper, the bass were probably off their feed. Dad and Lloyd came up the channel toward me and hefted up their stringer showing me 6 nice, bass and said they were quitting before it got too hot.

Wading and casting back toward my skiff, no strikes, nothing was happening, time to quit and get busy cleaning the fish. As I paddled back across the channel, it came to me that maybe this fly-fishing wasn’t all it was cooked up to be or maybe I was just too klutzy to figure it out, either way, I’m going back to speckled trout and popping rods and this trip turned out to be my last attempt at fly casting!

When I lived in the Atlanta suburbs, the Chattachoochie River was less, as the crow flies, 3 miles away and lured me, many times, to try my luck fishing.  Most folks liked to just lazily float down it, sip a few beers and get sunburned, but, not being a beer drinker, I just chose floatin’ and fishin’ in my 12 foot aluminum boat and electric trolling motor.  We would launch the boat at any number of places above Roswell Road, then float for several miles down to the I-285, North, bridge, and take out there.

We lived on Mark Trail Street in the Lost Forest subdivision that had previously been owned by the creator of the “Mark Trail”’ comic strip, popular in the 1940’s and 50’s. There were about 30 houses built around the hollow, in Texas called a draw and except for the ice storms, a great place to live!

Some interesting notes about the area where we lived in Georgia, Sandy Springs, finally incorporated in 2007, was bordered on the west by the Chattahoochee River, we lived a mile up an unnamed creek and just downstream and across the river was Soap Creek.  Where the river and creek joined, a large Civil War battle was fought and 2 of my Great Grandfathers participated in this fight.  This area is also part on the 6th Georgia Congressional District, where I had the opportunity to hear speak and vote twice for Newt Gingrich.  He lost the election in 1976, but won in ’78 and went on to lead the successful Contract With America and becoming Speaker of the House of
Representatives.

Finally the fishin’ and one trip stands out, Benny Evans, a coworker and fellow Texan and I launched the 12 foot boat way up the river, close to the gun club and made about a 6 mile, drift down to the 285 bridge. We would drift the middle, drift around the eddies and drift along the banks, casting to the numerous falls, trees down in the water. We would drift, then electric motor back over promising spots, trying to keep our baits, Mepps #2, Spinners, in the water as much as possible.

Here’s my Mepps #2 Spinner, the survivor of several floats down the river. This bait is over 40 years old, was fished several times in the Colorado and Black Rivers in Arizona and remains poison for small mouth bass, pan fish and fresh water trout.

We avoided all the tubers and ended the day with a mixed, mess of fish with 4, 15, inch large mouth bass.  Our stringer included the large mouths; 1 small mouth bass 12” inches long, a rainbow trout 12, inches long, 4 hand size bluegills, topped off by a 15, inch channel catfish! We probably caught over 50 fish and had twice that number of strikes. We even caught several good size, pike, or chain pickerel, returned to the water because of excessive bones.  This was by far the best day I enjoyed on the river!

Tubing was a family sport, and from May until September, the river was crowded with all sizes of tubes and people and in the late spring Georgia Tech University held its annual, “Ramblin’ Raft Race”, a true civic highlight. The future engineers at the school would design the most motley collection of floating contraptions imaginable. Prizes were awarded, classes cut, beer flowed and a grand time was had by all!  However, I’m sure by now the “Friends Of Wildlife”, “The Green Movement” or “The Nature Conservancy” has put a stop to all of this fun!

Besides getting sun burned, flashed or mooned, tubing, for me, was a serious waste of fishing time.

In early May 1968, my dad and I took off work early one afternoon and towed my second boat down to Galveston Island, bought a quart of shrimp for $4.00, launched it and headed out into west bay on the east side of the causeway. Our objective for the day was to find a school of birds, sea gulls, working over shrimp that the speckled trout were driving towards the surface.

This day we’d be using live shrimp and our tackle was 6-1/2 foot popping rods, Dad had a red reel and I had a direct drive model, both spooled with 15, pound line, popping corks, a 2 to 3 foot leader and small treble hooks.

We headed out to the Intercoastal Waterway, turned right, cut the motor down and started looking. Not 400 yards ahead, there was a big bird school and with no other boats in sight, we’d have this one to ourselves. Positioning our boat down wind from the birds, we drifted up and at 40 yards, made our first casts. Dad sailed his cast right in front of the birds and before he could turn his reel handle had a big strike and me, trying to hard to make a long cast, had a wonderful backlash!

While I picked at the backlash, Dad was in a big fight with the spec that later proved just under 5 pounds, but soon he wore it down and as I slid the net under it, Dad unhooked it and put it in the cooler, rebaited and cast back out. Finally proving victorious over the backlash, I cast out and we both had big strikes, good fish that circled us around the boat, wallowed on top and we finally tired both specs out and netted the almost 5 pounders. Having only one net on board, I netted my dad’s fish, then he netted mine and, while we were wasting precious fishing time with this school of fine trout, it fell to me to untangle the mess.

Untangling us, we baited up and cast out and had simultaneous strikes, 2 more nice fish, but mine slipped the hook and Dad brought his spec in, I netted it and added another to the box. Baiting up and casting out, Dad was immediately into another nice spec, while I had the Mother of all backlashes. This one shut down my fishing for the afternoon, Dad added 2 more almost 5 pounders giving us a total of 6, almost 30 pounds of speckled trout!

The birds finally dissipated, Dad cast out several times with no strikes, so we drifted for almost 15 minutes hoping the specs would gather back up, they didn’t, so we headed back in, filleted the fish and drove back to our southwest Houston homes, all the while me thinking, I’ll have to get me one of those smooth casting, red reels.