The most coveted record in fishing was was set almost seven decades ago - right here in Georgia. Despite the best efforts of 60 million anglers nationwide, it has weathered the challenges of time.

George Perry was just 19 years old that morning - June 2, 1932 - when he cast his only lure into a blackwater lake in remote Telfair County - and landed a place in history.

Fatter than a fully inflated basketball - and 32 1/2 inches long - his 22-pound, 4-ounce largemouth bass eclipsed the previous world record by more than two pounds.

Perry, a poor farmer, went fishing that day only because the fields were too wet to plow. His fishing spot, Montgomery Lake, was little more than a flooded oxbow off the nearby Ocmulgee River .

In a 1969 interview with Sports Afield magazine, Perry recalled the famous strike: "All at once the water splashed everywhere. I do remember striking, then raring back and trying to reel, but nothing budged," he said. "I thought for sure I'd lost the fish, that he'd dived and hung me up."

The mammoth bass must have been quite a sight as it sloshed toward the homemade boat Perry and his companion paddled among the cypress and tupelo trees that dotted the dark, tannin-stained water.

"I had no idea how big the fish was, but that didn't matter," Perry said. "What had me worried was losing the lure. It was the only one we had between us."

The lure, a natural scale Fintail Shiner, manufactured by the Creek Chub Bait Co., survived the battle, and the squirming bass was hoisted aboard.

Later that day, Perry and his companion, Jack Page, took their catch to the general store in nearby Helena , where the proprietor - a notary public - weighed and certified its dimensions and weight.

A customer mentioned a Field & Stream magazine bass contest, and encouraged Perry to enter his fish, which also was weighed and measured on certified scales at the town's post office.

Needless to say, the George Perry bass easily won the contest - and its $75 in prizes that included a rod and reel, and a new shotgun.

Perry's modesty prevented him from the incessant bragging that could have accompanied a bass half the size of the one he caught that day. In fact, he never even bothered to photograph the fish that became the world record largemouth bass.

Instead, he did what most Depression-era anglers did with their catch: he took it home and ate it.

Perry later moved to Brunswick , Ga. , where he became a self-taught pilot and businessman. He died in 1974, at the age of 61, when the plane he was flying crashed into a hillside near the Birmingham , Ala., airport.

With him died many of the details we'd like to know today about the famous catch, which is memorialized today in fishing displays and museums from Texas to Tokyo .

Today, sportfishing occupies the throne of American recreation, and has evolved into a $40 billion-a-year business.

Outdoor writers have speculated for seven decades over when - and where - the next world record bass will emerge.


Biologists everywhere insist there will be a new record, and perhaps the winning fish is out there now, just waiting. A new world-record bass would be worth millions to anyone lucky enough to catch it.

But so far, no one has.

Today, Montgomery Lake remains available to public fishing as part of the 8,500-acre Horse Creek Wildlife Management Area. It is partly filled with mud now, and offers few opportunities for trophy bass.

Despite intense trophy management programs in states such as Florida and California, John Biagi, Georgia's assistant fisheries chief, is optimistic the new record still could appear here in Georgia.

"If we can set this record, we certainly have the potential to break it," he said. "We have the habitat, the long growing season, the genetics, everything we need, so why not?"

In the meantime, visitors traveling the lonely stretch of Georgia Highway 117 between Jacksonville and Lumber City still pull onto the dusty shoulder to see the historical marker erected there in 1984.

It is interesting to note that the marker attributes Perry's catch to a different lure - the Creek Chub Wigglefish. Although the Wigglefish, or Wiggle Fish, was long thought to have been the lure used by Perry that day, a long-lost tape recorded interview made with Perry back in 1973 proves categorically that it was, indeed, a fintail shiner in natural scale finish - and not the Wigglefish claimed by even the marketing folks at Creek Chub Bait Company, who perhaps were eager to say one of their best selling baits caught the world record (the Wigglefish was made off and on into the 1970s while the Fintail Shiner vanished in the 1930s).

The bronze marker recounts Perry's feat, to make sure it is not forgotten.

Regardless of who catches the next world record bass, anglers everywhere will always cherish the memory of the barefoot farm boy in a leaky, wooden boat who made the cast of a lifetime one morning long ago.


 

 
But big it was. Using certified scales, his fish weighed in at 10.12 kg or 22 lb 4 oz. When measured, the fish had a fork length of 27.2 inches and a girth of 26.7 inches. The IGFA only has line classes up to 20 lb for largemouth bass, so Kurita had no chance at a line class record as well.

IGFA rules for fish caught outside the U.S. allows anglers 90 days to submit their applications from the date of their catch. The documentation was received through the IGFA’s sister association the Japan Game Fish Association (JGFA). IGFA conservation director Jason Schratwieser said Kurita’s application was meticulously documented with the necessary photos and video.

Kurita’s fish ties the current record held for over 77 years by Perry who caught his bass on Georgia’s Montgomery Lake, June 2, 1932, near Jacksonville, Georgia. That 22 lb 4 oz behemoth won Field and Stream Magazine’s big fish contest and 46 years later, when the IGFA took over freshwater records from Field and Stream, it became the All-Tackle record now one of over 1,100 fresh and saltwater species the IGFA monitors.