[MoparCharlie]

Part 3:

By spring I feel that New Jersey is closing in on me. I don't want to be there no more. It's time to leave. I tell my wife that I'd like to move up to New England, where I used to fish commercially. We wind up looking for property up there. I find a beautiful saltbox home, three bedrooms, three baths, a two-car garage, five acres of land. I buy it for my family.

We also decide to travel some more, to take the prize money and enjoy it. We travel extensively. We do what we want to do with our family. Sometimes we see people on hard luck and having tough times and we give money anonymously. We can't let people know that we help people and give money to charities. We don't want our names mentioned, because everyone will have their hand out. They think we're rolling in money.

People don't realize that if it wasn't for the $250,000 prize, I would have gotten next to nothing for catching that fish. But everybody throws that in my face - with $250,000, what am I crying about? It's the principle. I mean, come on, man. Ted Turner didn't stop at one million, Donald Trump didn't stop at a certain amount of money. You're supposed to make money and share the wealth.

One of the things I can't understand is when you have these news reporters come up to you and tell you they want to do an exclusive story, or they're freelance writing and want a story. As soon as you ask them what they're going to pay, they tell you that they have to talk to their editor about it. And then they come back and tell you that the editor says they can't pay you anything. Here these people are, traveling, getting their expenses paid, hotel, meals, a salary. Their newspapers are selling millions of copies and they start crying poor. They don't want to give you a dime. I hated that. I had people try to coerce stories out of me. Guys come down from New York telling me they're writing a book and they want an interview. Then, when I go to look for the book, the book never even came out.

You know, and I ain't joking when I say it, if I ever hooked another world-record fish I would think of cutting the line and letting it go. My oldest son says to me, "Dad, you should never pick up a rod ever again. It ain't worth it." I hope this story is going to open the eyes of anyone who thinks that catching a world record will make everything fabulous and wonderful. Let's talk about reality here.

I had people following me, watching me. I had all sorts of crazy things happening - phone calls, cars pulling up on our property with the lights off. People would pull up while I was fishing. I'd go to walk over to the car and they'd take off. When I went back fishing, they would pull up again. I'd try to walk up to them again and they would take off. I don't know what these people wanted. I have no idea. I wish I could have gotten a good attorney to advise me.

One time I went up to Maine on a trip and I walk into this bar there. It's like a little hunting bar. And I'm sitting there, and I had a jacket on with these patches for the tackle companies. Being a fool, I'm wearing these patches and these guys ain't paying me for them, but I'm advertising for them. They don't give a damn about me. This guy sees the patches on my jacket and he says, "What's all that stuff about?"

I says, "I'm the world-record holder for striped bass."

He says, "That's a damn lie. If you say that again I'll come around the bar and break your jaw. I'll fracture your skull. The world record was caught in Maine. You don't know what the hell you're talking about." And the bartender's standing there. Well, I got my stuff and I got the hell out of there.

It shook me up. I mean, here I am, the world-record holder for striped bass, and somebody wants to do me bodily harm because of it. I started thinking about what I did wrong. I didn't understand it. I'm just a regular guy. I learned. I would never wear any patches on any jackets, hats or shirts, or anything advertising these companies. Never again. Not for free I wouldn't do it.

I've had guys ask me, "You're the world-record holder for striped bass? Why are you so quiet, man? Why didn't you tell us who you are?" Because of things like this:

One time I'm in Brigantine, New Jersey, and there's a fishing tournament going on. I thought I'd go over and see what they are catching. There's a whole bunch of guys there, and they're having a little fish fry and beer bust. I walk up and this one guy's glaring at me. I never met this guy before in my life. He comes over to me and says, "You're the world-record holder for stripers?"

I say, "Yes."

He says, "How many stripes does a northern striper have and how many does a southern striper have?"

I say, "I really don't know. I didn't know there was a difference."

He says, "Yeah there is, you stupid ass. I told people that you don't know what you're talking about. You don't even know how many stripes there are on a striper!"

After I moved out of Atlantic City, I tried to go back just to visit. I pull up to the boardwalk and get out of the car with my two sons and we start to walk up the ramp. I get up to the top of the ramp and there's my cousin. He comes down the boardwalk, starts shoving me, poking his finger in my chest, telling me I deserted him. He said I was going to build him a tackle shop, said I was going to give him $10,000 like I gave the other guy. He's telling me my grandmother and grandfather would roll over in their graves if they knew what I turned into. I ought to be ashamed to show my face in Atlantic City. And he's doing this in front of my sons. We start backing down the boardwalk. He shoves me real hard and I go back against this rock. I laid the whole back of my foot open about five inches. We get back in the car. We drive out of there. I should have had him arrested for assault. This is what your family can do to you over money.

My sister calls me up and tell me she needs money. She's cheating on her husband with her minister and says that she found religion. The woman's out of her mind. When I won't give her the money, she tells me I should shove the money, and she wishes that I would die.

I've got an older brother who lives in Hawaii. He's a retired E9 Chief from the Navy. He married a Japanese girl from Okinawa and has a couple of kids. He finds out I have money and he contacts me. Tells me he's losing his home. And here he is with a chief's pension. God knows how much a chief gets after 30 years in the military. I break down and send him $10,000. He tells me he owns land in Bakersfield, California, and that he'll give us that as collateral, or he can give me a sword owned by his wife. It's a Samurai sword, worth thousands of dollars. But I don't take anything from the guy. I just want to help him out.

Later, I come to find out he's a used-car salesman, working part-time, and he's an alcoholic. When I ask about my money, he tells his kids and his wife that I'm nuts. He changes his phone number, his address, never pays me a dime. Think about lending money to your family!

It gets worse. I get a call from a former lifeguard who lives in Cleveland. He's in the money-management business. He deals with people like Mario Andretti, Arnold Palmer, Dick Butkus, Barbara Streisand, Johnny Mathis. This guy wants to take me on as a client. Well, he had me invest some money in stocks and bonds, stuff I know nothing about. I wound up getting wiped out. I lost money.

Now it doesn't give me any pride to tell people what eventually happened. This is the seriousness of catching the world record, winning the richest prize, and all these other things. We actually wound up losing our home. We lost all our money. We have no life insurance. We have no medical insurance. We wound up living in a car and living in motels with our children. And I was too embarrassed to ask anybody for help or tell anybody what our situation was. But I think it should be told. This is real life. This is the truth I'm telling you. Was it all worth it? Yes. They say life is a roller coaster. You have highs and lows. If you don't get on the roller coaster you never enjoyed life. Jackie Gleason said that fortunes are to be won, fortunes are to be lost and then won again. He says life is terrific. And he's right. Life is fantastic.

If you get to Florida and visit the IGFA headquarters, the new Fishing Hall of Fame, the replica of my world-record fish is hanging there when you come in the door. It's right above the world-record largemouth bass. There's also a painting of me standing on the rock jetty, and it shows the world-record fish coming up and taking the lure. The artist is a famous painter. He donated the painting to the IGFA. It's a $20,000 painting. It's called "The Moment of Truth