SHARK TALES

  There was a period when shark fishing was a big deal at the Naples Pier. Before that, and I presume now, folks that wanted to grapple with Jaws would lay outside Doctor's or Gordon's Pass on the outgoing tide, and try go catch the monsters where they naturally congregated. Sharks like to do their fishing in spots like that, being garbage collectors of any   trash food the tide washed out.

  But, for some reason, a few fishermen thought it was a real good idea to lure sharks to the Pier. And they did. Any evening you'd see these dubious sportsmen with monster rigs, baiting up with rotten hams, roasts, or fish parts and slinging the mess into the Gulf. Some even used chum, pouring buckets of putrid fish guts into the water. And at least once, most nights, the bait was taken and a fight commenced.

  Sharks don't willingly give up the life/death struggle. The fisherman could fight the beast for hours, being dragged up and down the Pier, crossing everyone's lines, and disrupting all the other fisher-folks fun. And when the shark was finally landed, the battle was still not over.

  Once a nine-foot Hammerhead was hooked, battled for hours, and eventually dragged up on the beach. When the fisherman walked up to his prize, thinking it was dead, he was greeted by a, suddenly, very alive Hammerhead slashing and trying to play some catchup. The fisherman decided he'd better call the cops and let them deal with the monster--that wasn't much fun now. Sgt J.D. Spohn arrived.

  Spohn nudged the shark with his toe, and when the critter came to life again, took out his revolver and put six thirty-eights in the shark's head. That just made Jaws angrier so Spohn, never outgunned,  went to his patrol car for heavier artillery. He returned with an M1  semi-auto carbine and went to work on the shark with that. Content the job was done, and it being after midnight, he left the carcass on the beach to be removed in the morning. In the AM the hammerhead was still alive.
  Scenes like this caused some sensible council folks to decide that maybe luring these formidable killers to an area where people liked to wade and splash about in the surf, wasn't such a real good idea after all. And shark fishing from the Pier was curtailed. 
  Smart move. During the same period we had an early morning swimmer disappear and his body never recovered.