Billfish boom: The evolution of offshore fishing in South Carolina - Charleston Post Courier
After several years of fishing out of Georgetown, Fitzgerald finally succeeded. He helped his wife Katherine, who went by Cappy, reel in South Carolina’s first blue marlin on June 4, 1964. The fish weighed 237 pounds. On board that day were the couple’s two children — 11-year-old Susie and 7-year-old Ken — along with Capt. “I didn’t realize the significance of what had just happened, at least I didn’t until we got the fish back to the dock,” said Susie Fitzgerald Carter, who now lives on James Island. It would be three years before another blue marlin was landed off South Carolina’s coast. Virginia Pingree caught a 395-pound blue marlin fishing out of Beaufort in 1967. The first blue marlin caught out of Charleston was a 325-pounder by Ned Thornhill in 1968. None of those anglers knew it at the time, but they were pioneers in what... The early days Much has changed since Cappy Fitzgerald — who died last year, 30 years after her husband passed away — caught that first blue marlin a half-century ago. It was much different when local fishermen like Buck Morris, now 93, and Harry Johnson, 86, began going offshore in the late 1950s and early 1960s. They didn’t venture too far offshore because their smaller boats had. Source: www.postandcourier.com
