Blues of Bygone Days From the Vineyard Gazette edition of Sept. 30, 1960:

The fishing derby, now in progress, brings ample proof that the Vineyard has passed through a cycle of nature that has been moving along for close to a century. This refers to the movement of fish, specifically, bluefish and striped bass.

There are no actual statistics available which apply to this phenomenon, nothing in fact, save the traditions that have come down through the generations.

A century ago, according to these tales, bluefish were extremely numerous around the Vineyard, and of a very large size. They schooled close to the beaches and provided exciting sport for sailing and fishing parties. Many pictures are still in existence, showing the old-fashioned boats, filled with men and women, splashing through the tide-rips while the passengers caught fish on trolling lines, but without rods.

But the stories of Vineyarders have dealt chiefly with the widespread practice of men and boys who fished off the Island beaches at night. They were not sportsmen, but farmers and laborers, sailers and shopkeepers, blacksmiths and carpenters. That is one of the reasons why they fished at night after their regular day’s work had been done. It was also true that the winds died down after sunset, and a beach line could be cast farther and with less difficulty.

There are no written accounts of those fishing expeditions by night, only the stories and, years ago, the corroded and rusting jigs to be found in boxes of odds and ends in every barn, woodshed and workshop on the Vineyard.

They were homemade jigs, cast from lead and rudely moulded in the form of a small fish, small, yes, but gigantic as compared with the manufactured article of today, this because the fish were huge as the stories go.

The distance which an expert beach-heaver could cast his jig was little short of phenomenal if the tales can be credited. But it should be realized that such fishing was pastime, a sport, for which these fishermen actually trained. During those months when there was no fishing, they gathered and practiced heaving a weight that would correspond to that of a jig, at a mark, set up in a field. They strove for distance and accuracy in the cast, and they whirled the lead around their heads at arms-length, or used a “throwing-stick”, so-called, to gain further advantage. Experts were developed in such a manner.

Nevertheless, bluefishing of this order was purely a sport, profitless in those days when such fishing was at its height. There was no market for these fish although such a market did eventually develop at a later date. Local people seldom ate bluefish, although just why has never been explained. Nevertheless, cartloads of the fish, taken on those nightly forays, were hauled back to the farms and there spread on tillage to be plowed under for fertilizer!

When, in the course of time, a market could be found for bluefish, the commercial fishermen did very little hook-and-line fishing for them, but employed seines, though it is not apparent that seining bluefish was ever followed to any great extent. Only a few experts followed it, and in small schooners, towing a couple of dories, they cruised around the shores, making a set where the fish schooled. This was strictly commercial in character, without property, romance or thrill included. In the meantime, the party boats carried their excited passengers, and the Island men went to the beaches by night and carried on as before, until the end came.

This was gradual. Schools ran smaller and kept to deeper water, until finally there were many men and boys who had never even seen a bluefish, much less taken one on a hook.

Now and then a run of very small fish appeared, and they were apt to enter the great ponds if the creeks were open. Sixty years ago, and even later than that, beach-eelers in Tisbury Great Pond excitedly reported snapper bluefish in that pond. So the end came, of what had been a cycle but of which Islanders had not heard in those days. All they knew was that the bluefish, once so plentiful, had disappeared.

As to the striped bass, which ran simultaneously with the blues, and lasted even longer, there are but few traditions, and such records as might have been kept have been lost or destroyed. But it is well known that Bass Clubs, large groups of sportsmen, and pretentious buildings, were established on Pasque Island, Cuttyhunk, and at Squibnocket on the Vineyard. A club was established on Noman’s Land, but this was not as large nor was the clubhouse as impressive.

Famous men came to the Vineyard to fish for the bass. Louis J. Vance was one of these, Prof. Louis Agassiz, another, and for many years after such sport-fishing ended, the rusting iron bars of their fish-stands could be seen in the rocks of Squibnocket Bight and elsewhere. That records for large fish were established in that era there is little doubt, but they were lost and forgotten.

Compiled by Hilary Wall
library@mvgazette.com