Frank Mundus (right) at the Montauk Marine Basin with a record 17-foot shark he caught in August 1986 with charterboat captain Donnie Braddick.Posted on 09/16/2008 2:42:41 PM PDT by BGHater
Heart attack takes famed Montauk fisherman
They called him the Monster Man. His business was the stuff of tall tales. Gear for the day might include a harpoon, buckets of blood and the patience to wait for a shark to come along and take a bite.
"I was the pioneer of sport fishing for sharks," Frank Mundus, a legendary shark hunter, said in his trademark blunt style on his Web site.
The Monster Man's own words sum up perfectly a life said to have inspired the movie "Jaws" and its roguish Captain Quint, played by the late Robert Shaw. Mundus died Wednesday of complications from a heart attack suffered Sept. 6, just after he returned to his Hawaii home from a fishing trip in Montauk. He was 82.
"He wanted to be remembered as a pioneer in his sport," said Mundus' wife of 20 years, Jeanette, 46. "He was an extrovert, a straight shooter. He never held back."
The New Jersey-born Mundus came to Montauk in 1951 to be a fisherman. He quickly became a local celebrity, running a charter boat business and taking thrill-seekers out into the Atlantic Ocean to catch sharks.
Great whites, threshers, makos, blue sharks. Whatever it was, Mundus caught it, and he soon earned a reputation as a man who spearheaded a new fishing craze on the East End.
Said to have inspired 'Jaws'
In the 1960s, one of Mundus' customers was the author Peter Benchley, who later penned the novel that would inspire Steven Spielberg's 1975 blockbuster about a megashark terrorizing a cozy island village.
Frank Mundus (right) at the Montauk Marine Basin with a record 17-foot shark he caught in August 1986 with charterboat captain Donnie Braddick.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...
PING!!!
We bent an elbow or two at Star Island. RIP Monster Man
Might? He did...well the character of Quint anyways. Peter Benchley would tell a story of how he went fishing with Mundus in the early 60’s. Saw a good documentary on him naarated by Roy Schieder where he went to South Africa to see the flying great whites.
Sums up a heck of a man.
My boss said Mundus had the earring because he had crossed the international date line.
How can a shark hunter inspire Israel?
Quint would NOT have had his own website. Such is the thing of girly-men and self-defined philosophers.
Quint would NOT have had his own website. Such is the thing of girly-men and self-defined philosophers.
Different traditions of the seas. Some say sailors got it for crossing the equator or if they washed ashore dead that the gold would pay for their funeral.
Did he serve aboard the U.S.S. Indianapolis?
No.
"Me Father was a Tree!"
I’ll say: He married a 26-year-old when he was 62, and it appears to have worked out well.
My sympathies to the gentleman’s family and friends. Looks like he lived a full life!
“50 Years a Hooker” ... rest MonsterMan ... the sharks will too. ;D
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