ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 26, 1996 TAG: 9612260092
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: OUTDOORS
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN
For 80-year old John Barlow, the 41-year old hoax is over.
Gone, too, is the 11-pound, 15-ounce world record smallmouth bass that has dominated the books for more than four decades.
The International Game Fish Association, the official keeper of record catches, has disqualified one of the best-known records of all time, replacing it with a 10-pound, 14-ounce smallmouth caught in 1969.
The straight-laced IGFA called the action a ``bizarre situation,'' and that's no fish tale.
The bogus world record got its start mid-summer 1955, in Dale Hollow Lake, Tenn., when David Hayes caught an 8-pound, 15-ounce smallmouth. That's a huge fish, but it got even bigger when Hayes turned his back and his guide, Barlow, added 3 pounds of weight to the fish by stuffing it with sinkers and outboard motor parts.
When IGFA took over freshwater record-keeping responsibilities from Field and Stream magazine in 1978, it inherited the smallmouth record, although it admits there was very little documentation available. For years, anglers have considered the catch a nearly impossible goal to beat. No one has come within a pound of the record. Virginia's smallmouth record is a 7-pound, 7-ounce New River catch.
Earlier this year, Eldon Davis, a freelance writer and assistant school principal in Livingston, Tenn., began investigating the long-standing world record catch. Davis became suspicious when he organized a Big Buck Show in his hometown. To draw a bigger crowd, he asked Hayes to display his world record smallmouth.
According to Bassmaster Magazine, many fishermen who attended the show said they had 8- and 9-pound bass on their walls at home that were of similar size.
When Davis began his probe, he found Dale Hollow fishermen who said the record was a hoax. Even more revealing, he learned that Barlow had filed an affidavit admitting that to be the case. In fact, five weeks after he had doctored the fish, Barlow filed the document with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
In its most recent newsletter to its members, IGFA reported: ``According to the affidavit, John Barlow, a guide working out of Cedar Hill at the time, was asked by the dock owner to take some weights and increase the 8-pound, 15-ounce weight of the fish to world record size.''
While several others watched, apparently out of the sight of Hayes, the gullet of the bass was stuffed and its throat was pinned shut so the weights wouldn't fall out, IGFA said. The next day, before Hayes took his fish to a taxidermist, the weights were removed.
``For some unexplained reason, the affidavit was ignored until brought to light by Davis,'' the IGFA report said.
Barlow was asked to take a lie detector test to verify the authenticity of his affidavit. He passed, IGFA said. The catch was disqualified and the record fell back to a 10-pound, 14-catch by Gorman, which also is a Dale Hollow bass. Gorman, now 82, caught his fish while trolling a white Doll Fly jig.
The smallmouth caper, one of the most unusual fishing stories of 1996, has cast suspicion on the 22-pound, 4-ounce world record largemouth bass caught in Georgia by George Perry in 1932. According to B.A.S.S. Times, there is no record the bass was weighed on certified scales and there are no pictures for close-up study. The Perry family reportedly ate the fish soon after it was caught.
Records are given more scrutiny nowadays. In Virginia, a state record must be weighed on state-inspected scales by an official of the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries and must be examined by a biologist who verifies the species and checks for foreign objects in its stomach.
LENGTH: Medium: 70 linesby CNB