54 
FOREST AND STREAM 
February, 1920 
Tarpon Inn at Port Aransas, Texas — once the home of many good fishermen 
HIS paper was ivritten about 
the end of June, 1918. It ought 
to be of special interest at the 
present time because of the fact that 
the town of Port Aransas was en- 
tirely wiped off the map some four 
months ago by the hurricane that 
did so much damage in the city of 
Corpus Christi and its neighbor- 
ing towns. Whether it will be built 
up again as a fishing resort is 
problematical, because the good 
people of the place at one fell 
swoop lost all their worldly posses- 
sions, saving nothing but their 
l' ! ''cs and not quite all of those. For 
the sake of the fishing fraternity 
it is to be hoped that some ar- 
ranaement will be made for taking 
care of the svortsmen next sum- 
mer. The fish will be there, but 
unless there are boats, boatmen, 
tackle for rent, and conveniences 
for sleeping and eating, there will 
not be much use in going to the 
place. Of course, one could take 
along a full fishing outfit, a tent, 
provisions, a cooking kit, a cast- 
ing net for bait, and an outboard 
motor and manage fairly well, even 
without a boatman. 
Last summer my son Leonard 
and I repeated the experience of 
the year before. We remained at 
the resort three iceeks, and in that 
time landed between us sixty tar- 
pon and a large number of other 
fishes, most of the catch being 
taken during the first half of the 
outing, the weather during the lat- 
ter half being unpropitious . 
We left our tackle there with 
Mayor Cotter, expecting that some 
member of my family would go 
down for the combined fishing and 
shooting about the end of October; 
hut alas! it is now “gone where 
the ‘woodbine twineth” — and our 
future sport with it. — ( Author’s 
Note) . 
A three hundred and fifty-three pound Jew-fish 
prietor of a flourishing grocery store, 
while Bob continues to do taxidermy and 
fishes for the market. He still is very 
successful, especially in catching jewfish, 
which now bring a good price — eight 
cents per pound, dressed, if I remember 
correctly. Without any exception what- 
soever, Robert Farley is the best posted 
man I have ever met or even heard of, 
concerning the fish and the game birds 
of the Gulf Coast, their peculiarities and 
habits, and how best to take them. He 
has studied them carefully in both Texas 
and Mexico; and he is well acquainted 
with the rare or uncommon types of both 
fish and game. 
M Y son, who was to' bring our tackle 
from Kansas City, not having ar- 
rived, it was necessary for me to 
rent an outfit from the proprietor. He 
provided me with a Murphy rod, a some- 
what old-fashioned reel, and a No. 32 
line with three snells. It was not a bad 
outfit, although I got my right thumb 
pinched and skinned two or three times 
before becoming accustomed to the ma- 
nipulation of the reel. The advantage of 
the Murphy rod is that it is hard to 
break, but it lacks resilience and soon 
takes a bad permanent set. It is just 
the thing for a tyro fisherman; but a 
Hope rod is more satisfactory to an ex- 
pert. 
The light-tackle fad has reached Port 
Aransas, and they now have there a 
light-tackle club which gives annual 
prizes and buttons of various colors to 
those who land certain-sized fish on the 
new standard outfit. That kind of fish- 
ing never appealed to me; and for hand- 
ling full-sized tarpon I greatly prefer a 
No. 36 line on the best and most modern 
new Hope reel attached to a 26 oz. rod. 
Even with that outfit a tarpon generally 
has the better chance of winning in the 
fight. 
At Aransas they no longer use the for- 
ward brake, which consists of a piece of 
rubber belting about five inches long and 
an inch wide tied rigidly to the rod some 
ten or twelve inches ahead of the reel. 
It is operated by pressing the line against 
it with the left thumb, on which is placed 
a tightly-fitting, crocheted-cotton guard. 
Each of my rods is equipped with this 
brake, and I find it of great advantage. 
It is the advent of the light tackle that 
has relegated the forward brake into the 
background, because it could not be op- 
erated on a light-tackle outfit without 
bringing something to grief. The rear 
brake, consisting of a piece of leather or 
rubber belting attached to a bar of the 
reel and operated by the right thumb, is 
still in fashion, being useful when making 
a cast; but I find that I do not often 
have occasion to employ it in playing a 
fish, because my right thumb is gener- 
ally occupied with the reel-handle. 
I notice that the piano-wire snells are 
shorter than they used to be — not more 
than two and a half feet long — and that 
only one swivel is employed. In the old 
days we used three, on the theory that 
that many were necessary in order to 
prevent untwisting the line. However, on 
this trip I noticed no untwisting from 
the use of a single swivel, hence I agree 
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