Posted on January 10 2011
Former southwest Florida guide turned author (Doc Ford suspense/thriller novels) turned restaurant owner Randy Wayne White decided it was time to set the record straight on where the sport of tarpon fishing first took root. “Much of the knowledge of this region’s extraordinary tarpon fishery and its historical tender have been forgotten, misplaced or lost. In popular fishing magazines around the world, stories about tarpon inevitably mention the Florida Keys and Homosassa, Florida; Belize, and the Rio Colorado in Costa Rica but, ironically, ignore the very place where the sport was founded and first flourished.” (From the introduction.)
The result is a 400-plus-page book edited by White and Carlene Fredericka Brennen, a collection of photos, stories and interesting facts: like Thomas Edison’s addiction to tarpon fishing (albeit, it seems, with an unbaited hook so as not to break the intellectual reverie).
Amy Bennett Williams writes in detail about the book for the Fort Myers News-Press.
Randy Wayne White’s Ultimate Tarpon Book: The Birth of Big Game Fishing