Sharks on a Line 93 



directed as many as a thousand men who set out to sea in big canoes 

 on two specified days of the year. They hunted, on these appointed 

 days, only one kind of shark— /^^pe?^, apparently a species of dogfish. 

 Other species of sharks could be caught any time. 



In 1961, in the apparently civilized precincts of Lauderdale-by-the- 

 Sea, Florida, there was a taboo on shark fishing. The taboo was inspired 

 not by black magic, but by the even more potent talisman of the tourist's 

 dollar. Fishing for sharks, barracuda, or sting rays in the territorial 

 waters of Lauderdale-by-the-Sea was forbidden in 1961 because, in the 

 words of Mayor G. H. Colnot, "the sight of them being caught frightens 

 tourists and makes them believe our waters are infested with dangerous 

 fish." The fact is that Florida waters are full of sharks. In one 6-month 

 period, a shark-fishing club in Palm Beach, Florida, caught 21 sharks, 

 averaging 318 pounds, right off the pier, near the world-famous bathing 

 beach. 



For years a Florida shark-fishing enthusiast has been pulling in sharks 

 every Sunday by casting for them from Boynton Beach. The surf-casting 

 sharker is Herb Goodman, a 5 foot-6 inch, 135-pounder who habitually 

 catches sharks three or four times his own weight. Goodman fishes 

 exclusively for shark, using a unique method. He attaches balloons to 

 three big, baited 10/0 hooks, which are strung on a 130-pound test line. 

 The balloons act as floats, carrying the hooks 1,000 feet out to sea on the 

 swift-flowing currents of Boynton Beach Inlet. The hooks are baited 

 with about 6 pounds of bonito, kingfish, or dolphin. When a shark 

 strikes, Goodman works it in on a 9-foot glass rod, and the fight the 

 shark puts up usually draws a crowd. Once, deciding to give the crowd 

 a thrill, he decided to ride a 10-foot Hammerhead he had hooked and 

 reeled in close to the beach. 



"I passed my rod and reel to someone else," Goodman recounted, 

 "and climbed on the shark's back. A sudden swell tipped both me and 

 the shark, and when he tried to right himself, he swished his tail and 

 caught me across both my legs. My legs were covered with bandages 

 for almost two weeks." 



That was the last time Goodman tried to ride a shark. 



Another unorthodox shark fisherman who hauled in sharks to the 

 consternation of bathers was U.S. Marine Sergeant Richard C. Lawrence. 

 His hunting grounds were the waters off Fort Weaver, Hawaii. Law- 

 rence's fishing line consisted of an inner tube lashed to a piling on the 

 Fort Weaver pier and attached to a 150-foot length of quarter-inch 

 manila rope. Secured to the other end of the rope were 3 feet of V2-irich 

 chain and a 4-inch shark hook. He threw the baited hook about 20 feet 

 off the pier and just waited. Soon a shark grabbed the bait and tried 

 to dislodge the hook by pulling on the line. The inner tube— and Sergeant 



