Conversations with Buck

[DouglasBush]

Sometime in 1975.....its a Sunday morning, the phone rings.
Me: "hello" Voice: "hey Doug, Buck Perry here you got a few minutes?"
"Sure Buck whats up...."
Buck says "Well I'm up here in Chicago with all these thieves in the fishing business and I was thinking about entering you in some of those big time bass fishing tournaments. I'll be your coach and guide, have fish located in areas for you and all you gotta do is go win the thing and we'll REALLY put spoonplugging on the map"
Me, (after a few deep breaths)....."Coach (I always called him The Coach) let me tell you what those things are really all about and how crooked those guys are. Not in "hiding out fish", thats amateur stuff...these guys got it down to a science in how they steal your locations, blockade your areas with boats of their friends so you cant get to them ,move in on your spots at night and drag anchors through them, etc etc etc"
After about an hour of chat, he began to get the mesaage that the tournament thing was not what would put spoonplugging on the map for all to see.
As for me, I was in total awe that he had chosen ME, at that time a 27 year old pup, to be his man.
Although I wasnt a complete fishing idiot then. That was when I was gambling for money all over Georgia & Alabama as a fish hustler the same way old time travelling pool hustlers used to work their circuits.
I'd walk into a marina, wave a handfull of 20 dollar bills, and loudly announce..."anybody in this dump wanta gamble money on fishing?"
Of course I had the spoonplugs and the skills of locating fish faster than all the guides, etc. AND the knowledge of what makes a fish tick wasnt as widespread as it is now.
By making all that noise in the opening you let 'em know right away that you werent trying to ambush them and that you were just hell on wheels with this fishing and would bet with both hands. Then they could never whine about being conned or scammed. They'd be on the phone like crazy calling so-and-so to come to the marina and "tame this young upstart" who wanted to bet money on his game.
The deal would go down like this...I put my man in your boat to watch you and you put your man in my boat to watch me and we go at it for 7 hours, come back and weigh in. Most weight of fish gets the cash. I always travelled with a buddy...a HUGE karate and boxing expert to have as the "muscle" in case anybody got nasty about paying off. Didnt have any of that though as the stakes would be usually posted with the dock operator and everyone could see what was going on at the "weigh-in".
In 2 years of doing this....I never lost a bet. Not one single time! Some of those guys would bet pretty high too....$500-$700 a match, although most matches would be at a modest $200. And you could come out okay too because gasoline was cheap then and motels werent to the moon either.
Then Buck sent me a letter one day and says..."I can get you some good money every month writing articles for Fishing Facts Magazine as I am the education director and Carl Malz is on the staff too. You write 5 pages, double spaced, and be sure and TEACH something (I am going to go over it and rip it to shreds if I hate it) and they'll pay you $500 for each article you write. You'll never get anywhere by yourself, but with me running the show for you, you can write these things and it will take some of the heat off me in having to write one each month myself"
Now you can just imagine how quick I jumped on that deal. $500 for ONE ARTICLE....in 1975!!!! That was VERY good money.
And thats how I ended up writing for Fishing Facts magazine....it was all because of Buck, he paved the way, and opened the doors that I would've never got opened. That man was one of a kind....and I loved him a lot.
Regards,
Doug Bush

[pat maio]

Great story. Loved it. When you find time pump in some more..
pat

P.S. I'm getting the impression that the tournament boys are not entirely honest

[Jerry Borst]

That's good stuff, Thanks!

[david powell R.]

Great story tks.But since you opend that box of worms ,that in 2 years you never lost a bet. how about some of those stories,lakes, wagers,how many bass, how you caught them .

[DouglasBush]

I caught them the same way all spoonpluggers catch them. Running the shallows to the deep, etc etc.
Most limits came on 200's......running in that 8-10 foot water. "point hopping" and then dragging the dropoffs with worms....5 casts and then off to the next place.
Lakes weren't as clear 30 years ago down here so we had good water color in most places....duck soup.
It was a game of "anything goes"....I could troll and they wouldnt or couldnt. And not being a moron, I picked my weather situations too.
I had a 1967 15 foot Ouachita with a 33 Johnson on it and a tiller handle. Best damn rig I ever had....that sucker would turn on a dime.
Regards,
Douglas

[Garry Boggs]

Doug, did you fish Walter F. George (Eufula) in 1971, 1972 and 1973?

I was a flight instructor stationed at Ft. Rucker, Alabama and I clearly remember my first visit to this resevoir. My wife and I walked out on the dam and sat down on the rip rap about 2/3 of the way from shore to the locks to enjoy a picnic. We had been there about 30 minutes when Tom Mann and Jerry McKinnis pulls up in Tom's boat with a camera boat following. Tom and Jerry started casting plastic worms to the edge of the rip rap. The next two hours were unbelievable as we watched them catch their limit of huge bass. Jerry caught the biggest one which was 13lbs.

My wife and I did not know the names of these two fishermen we were watching but a few months later Tom Mann was a quest speaker at our bass club on base and he showed slides of him and Jerry the day we saw them at Eufula. At one of the breaks I asked Tom if he remembered seeing my wife and I sitting on the rip rap watching them. He told me they indeed had and were hoping we would leave soon because he had to pee. A year or two later Jerry showed the video on his TV show the Fishing Hole.

One of the things I remember about Tom is he hated baitcasting reels and instead would use a 7' heavy action Eagle Claw spinning rod with a big Mitchell open face reel.

[DouglasBush]

Yes, I was there during the glory days of that lake and I have fished with Tom Mann 3-4 times. He indeed loved those long Eagle Claw spinning rods with that great big Mitchell on it. He could throw that Little George a mile with that rig. This was back before the modern electric anchors and Tom had that boat of his rigged with motors from aircraft surplus bomb bay doors to pull up the anchors and they sounded HORRIBLE.
One thing about being a good hustler is you learn how to pick your marks, research the other man's game, and try to get the best of it. No way would I have challenged Tom Mann on that lower end...he had that thing in his pocket. I might have gone up against him heads up if he had spotted me like 9-5 on the money and two pounds on the stringer.
Another good one on that lower end was Bennie Edwards from somewhere over there in Alabama. I never personally met John Powell (he was a sgt. in the air force), he was kind of aloof. The first time I met Jimmy Houston was at Chewalla Marina at a tournament in 1968. He was thin as a rail back then (we all were) and he was selling insurance for a living..then a few years later he was on television rolling in the money.
I did have some shoot outs with a few out of Florence Landing up the lake. Always did good at the intersection of Rood Creek into the Chattahoochee channel and the same for Little Barbour creek.
Oh yea, I forgot about Butch Jordan out of Columbus, he had a boat dealership and he was a good one too. Would bet as high as you wanted to go too.
As I've said here many many times, those top tournament guys are not morons...they just place more faith in aids than we do. And their mapping is almost ridiculous, but they DO catch a lot of fish under some very tough conditions too.
If you fished it much back then, I'm sure you remember the HORRIBLE cottonmouth moccasin situation that was on that lake. Never have I seen anything that scary.
Stay happy,
Douglas

[Garry Boggs]

Doug, I hope my wife doesn't read your last post. I kept telling her they were harmless water snakes! Do you remember the little cove on the east side south of the Eufula bridge? The locals called crappie cove? It was full of trees and alligators. We would go in there to catch crappies in the spring and my fishing partner was ok until he saw one of the gators slide off the bank into the water. Another time we were fishing from the rip rap at the dam when I noticed he had stopped fishing. I asked him why he stopped and he pointed out a dead mocassin that would move every time a wave would came in. He finally asked if we could move to a different spot.

Another time my fishing partner (the one who hated snakes) and I had just finished bowhunting deer on base one fall morning. As I was driving out on a sandy lane, I spotted a giant diamondback rattlesnake crossing the road just ahead of me. I wanted the skin and rattle’s so I floored the VW and slammed on the brakes as I drove over him. I looked out my side and didn't see the snake so I asked my friend to look out his side. He rolled down the window and when he struck his head outside he turned white and couldn't talk for awhile. Finally he said GO - Get out of Here. After he calmed down I asked what that was all about and he said I had just caught the tail with my front right tire and the snake had managed to crawl up the side of the door so when my friend stuck his head out the widow the were eye ball to eye ball. He later told me he aged at least 10 years that day.

[david powell R.]

Doug i would love to know how you became a spoonplugger and meet Buck.

[DouglasBush]

I think it was 1964.....and I came across an old newspaper article in a junk bookstore about this guy named Perry from NC who had made this huge catch of fish up on Lake Lanier, north of Atlanta. There was a little radio show here that did a 15 minute spot every afternoon called "Inside Outdoors" and the guy who ran it was called John Martin and he'd been with Buck when that big score was made. I'm talking about a 55 pound stringer of bass. And Buck was doing lectures at the sporting goods department of Rich's Department Store in downtown Atlanta.
I was a fair fisherman even then, but common sense told me there HAD to be a reason why the fish quit hitting in the day and then would start up again in the evening. I also wondered just where did they go and how did they get there, wherever "there" happened to be. I had no clue about seasonal migrations other than the "fish spawn in the spring" but I did realize that after a cold front everything went to hell for fishing..that just came from being skunked enough times to wake up and smell the coffee.
So I started writing to this Buck Perry guy in Hickory but he was always out on the road so Marge, his wife, (the one who died from cancer) would respond. She knew what it was all about too. And I started out fishing the lures and I caught fish right off...no problem. I fell in love with that 200 for straggler chasing and then I'd get 'em from the deep with plastic worms or spoons. I had an old GreenBox Fish Lokator and his writings along with the lures and that green box opened up a new world to me. I never had a problem catching fish.....except in handling that damn wire line.
Then I found out when he was in town and I just took off and drove up there. I'll always remember that first meeting, he came out of the shop and had wrists and forearms like a blacksmith and was smoking those Camel cigarettes. Helluva nice guy. Invited me over to the house, which was right next to the shop (the old one next to the bowling alley) for supper and we talked and talked and he showed me his weather slides (all later destroyed in the fire) and I was just eating this up.
And I would keep going back and forth up there to visit and he'd always coach me in some area where I was weak. Those slides he made of various skies and weather conditions were MAGNIFICENT! Its a shame they were all lost in that fire
Then about 1966 or 1967 he had Vic Saunders and Terry O'Malley down in Florida doing promotions and I was jumping up and down wanting to be a part of that team. But he told me, "kid, you're not ready for that yet..you dont have the miles under your belt". At the time, I was furious...but later I realized he was right. Vic and Terry were wayyyy ahead of my game. Especially Terry, with his mapping skills...for my money he was the best at mapping and I dont think there will ever be another like him. (Although Buck always said that Don Nichols was the best....even better than himself)
So we kept up the correspondence and the visits until Marge died and then he became somewhat of a recluse for quite a while. Terry had quit fishing. Vic Saunders was making lures. And I was out on the hustler trail and in the middle of dealing with a brutal divorce.
Then about the time he met Gerri, I went up there again and he was like a new man...happy, laughing, like his old self. She was perfect for him. To top that off I got remarried too and my new wife turned out to be perfect for me also.
And thats about the way it all started out.
Regards,
Douglas

[jwt]

Douglas,
Vic Saunders is alive and kicking up here in IL. He's a member of our Northern Illinois Spoonplugger Club, and regales us now and then with stories about the old days with Buck and Terry.

[Bart]

Douglas,

Excellent stories! Keep 'em coming.

[david powell R.]

Does anyone know, back in the day when buck was traveling the country. People like Terry o. Don dickson Vic saunders where they hired by Buck,or did they pay Buck,or just what was the arrangement.