Newport Pier Fishing
1890s—
Mort Hubbard is the boss fisherman as far as heard from. He caught two Jew fish off Newport pier yesterday that were some for size, and had passed the minnow period by some years, no doubt. The larger one pulled down the springs at 225 pounds and the smaller at 175 pounds. The largest one was brought to the fish market and has been on sale. It measured about five feet in length.
—Santa Ana Weekly Blade, July 11, 1889
A gentleman, whose name we did not learn, was stung by a stingray at Newport wharf, yesterday. He was taking fish from a net and was stung in the arm. The stinger was broken off in the arm, and it required some time to extract it,
—Santa Ana Weekly Blade, August 15, 1889
A Jew-fish, weighing 288 pounds was caught at McFadden’s Landing Monday.
—South Riverside Bee, August 23, 1889
We are now at Newport Beach, 11 miles by rail south of Santa Ana—a beautiful new little place. It has a fine hotel and a few other good buildings; also a great many tents and is quite a shipping point for Santa Ana, Riverside, San Bernardino and other places up the valley…
The wharf is about thirty feet wide, and extends out in the water about fifty rods to where the water is very deep, and from the wharf is very fine fishing; sometimes there are as many as three hundred fishing at a time—old and young, men, women and children—a row sitting as close as they can, and a row standing behind them, fishing over, their heads.
They fish with pole and line, drop-lines and throw-lines. They will put six or eight pounds of bait on their hooks and swing it round their heads, then throw it, and it will light fifty or a hundred yards out in the water. Many times, as soon as it lights, a Jew-fish will take the bait and dart off through the water, and make the line sing. Some one halloos “Jew-fish” the crowd will jump up and begin to cheer like a Chicago convention; they let him run round in the water until he gets tired out, and then will pull him up to the wharf; then it takes a good piece of engineering to get it on the wharf, for that is about twenty feet above water. If it is a very large fish (and some of them weigh as much as 500 pounds), they will spear him, then will slip ropes around it, and, with the aid of five or six strong men, will hand him on the wharf.
There are a great many mackerel here. I have seen acres of them. They go in schools, and the water seems to look black with them. They are a very gamey fish, and always bite quick and lively. When a school of them goes by the wharf we have fine fishing. We catch them by the hundreds, three or four at a time, for we all fish with several hooks on our lines. We catch them until the wharf is covered with them, for we don’t take time to pick them up. A school don’t stay more than half an hour, till they pass on, and there is not one left to catch…
At times we catch a good many bass. Some days there are more than a ton of them caught here.
There are a great many sharks here. I have seen a wagon-load on the wharf, that were speared from the wharf, some six and some ten feet long.
There is what is called a stingaray; it has for protection a small sword on the end of its tail, with barbed hooks. The sword, or stinger, is about 5 inches long and nearly one-half an inch wide. They can thrust it through a person’s foot. The sting is poisonous, but the fish is harmless unless stepped on, so we are careful where we step. We spear the stingaray and the sharks also, and put them in a large kettle and boil them, then feed the fish at the end of the wharf to attract the fish so we can catch them.
—J. D. Gard, Santa Ana Weekly Blade, September 8, 1892
Santa Ana Free Press, Nov. 11; A large Jew fish, weighing 330 pounds, was caught yesterday at Newport by Mort Hubbard, and this morning it was brought triumphantly into town. It was a splendid fish and attracted great attention.
—South Riverside Bee, November 22, 1889
The fishing from the wharf is good. Yesterday a 250-pound jewfish was caught.
—Los Angeles Herald, June 14, 1894
Since the large catch of fish yesterday at Newport wharf nearly everybody wants to go fishing. A four-horse ‘bus-load’ was made up this morning at Orange by Inman & Canfield and driven to the beach early to try their hand at the fish pole.
—Los Angeles Herald, November 23, 1894
One poor lone fisherman caught nine huge yellowtails at Newport yesterday Friday). As a rule Friday is considered a very unlucky day, and yet it is upon this day that many people eat fish.
—Los Angeles Times, September 22, 1895
A Monster Jew Fish
Newport Beach starts off with the prize fish story of the season. Some fisherman, whose name could not be learned today by the Times correspondent, caught a monster jewfish at Newport Tuesday with hook and line—an ordinary sized rope—that tipped the beam at 360 pounds solid avoirdupois. But that is not all. It was decided to ship the monster to Los Angeles to be served in the markets there, and while the fishermen were hauling in the big fellow up on a flat-car, he gazed down his cavernous throat and thought he saw another fish. Reaching down the big jew’s moth, he laid hold of the head of a halibut that had been swallowed evidently only a little while before the captive had been pulled ashore. The halibut weighed thirty pounds, and was as fresh as if taken directly from the end of a troll line.
—Los Angeles Times, March 26, 1896
A man-eating shark, ten and one-half feet in length, was killed at Newport Beach Sunday afternoon. Two men speared the big fellow at the end of the wharf and towed him to the beach. Dr. Ida B. Parker secured several of the creature’s teeth as trophies.
—Los Angeles Times, June 29, 1894
Good fishing at Newport wharf has attracted the fishermen of the San Pedro Canning company. On last Wednesday, by means of purse nets and hooks and lines, they captured four tons of yellowtail, sardines and mackerel. It is said the yellowtail were so plentiful and hungry that the net haulers had to beat them off with poles in order to land the nets which were crowded with sardines.
—Los Angeles Herald, September 5, 1896
Mr. J. M. Sare states that yesterday’s fishing at Newport wharf excelled anything he ever saw. The big yellowtail kept the water in a boil, chasing mackerel and other fish up to the very edge of the sands. His wife caught three fifteen-pounders in a few minutes. Fish were stacked on the beach like cordwood, the largest being offered at a nickel apiece. Newport wharf certainly offers good opportunities to a canning company. The best fish of the Pacific frequent the adjacent waters in numbers unparalleled on this coast.
—Los Angeles Herald, September 19, 1896
The largest school of yellowtail fish seen at Newport since the big wharf was built, about seven years ago, was seen today. Over eight hundred of them, weighing in all over seven tons, were caught with hook and line and a large net.
—Los Angeles Times, September 22, 1896
Orange County—Fishermen at Newport had good success on Sunday. Over one hundred yellowtail were caught from the wharf, besides a lot of bass and cod.
—Los Angeles Times, August 10, 1897
Good Fishing
Fishing at Newport is good. Yesterday over two hundred yellowtail were hooked from the wharf, and this good showing was backed by a large number of barracuda, bass, mackerel and a one-hundred-pound sunfish. The catch is a good deal better than it has been for several years.—Los Angeles Times, August 14, 1897
Fell Into The Ocean
One of the principal amusements at Newport Beach at present is harpooning sharks of which the surf is full, from the wharf. As John Smith shoot his spear into the water after one of them Saturday, he lost his balance and followed in himself. After swimming around for a while, he was pulled to the wharf with the harpoon ropes by the other fishermen, and suffered from nothing more than a good ducking.—Los Angeles Times, July 12, 1898
Unusually Good Fishing At Newport Beach
Santa Ana, Sept. 18—There never has been such fishing at Newport Beach before as there was yesterday and today, especially yesterday. From appearances, about all the fish in the big drink seemed to make their way up to and around the end of the wharf, so that some anxious fisherman or fisherwoman could hook them and haul the, ashore. There were mackerel, big yellowtail and barracuda until one couldn’t rest. They all seemed anxious to decorate a hook and line, and the way they piled out on the wharf for a time was exhilarating to the many fishermen who were lined up along the sides and end of the wharf. Everybody caught fish, and when the bait was all used, rags were tied on the hooks, and the fish were sent flying out on the dry, rough wharf almost before they knew what had happened to the. One lady reports, and there is no good reason for doubting what she says, that she hadn’t time to bait her hooks, and that she became so excited she threw out her line without any bait; that no sooner had this been done than a big mackerel took a double half hitch of the cord around his tail, and she triumphantly swung him out onto the wharf. During the day yesterday over four hundred fish were caught, and many more would have been landed had there been people there to hook them—Los Angeles Times, September 18, 1898