IGFA to honor Oregon Inlet skipper Billy Baum

Billy Baum, an offshore charter boat fishing skipper for 50 years at Oregon Inlet, is scheduled to be honored by the prestigious International Game Fish Association.

Baum, now 88, is among six men who will be added to the organization’s “Legendary Captains and Crews” listing. The sixth annual ceremony is scheduled Feb. 13 at IGFA headquarters in Dania Beach, Fla.

Baum is a native of Wanchese, just across Roanoke Sound from Oregon Inlet, and resides in his hometown during summers. He spends winters in Florida, where he also took parties fishing for 33 years during the colder months.

“It’s right chilly here today,” Baum said with a teasing chuckle Tuesday by phone from his home in the Sunshine State. “It’s 69 degrees.”

At the time the termperature was in the mid-40s in the Charlotte area.

Baum became widely known and admired among coastal anglers during his long career as a licensed captain, both for finding and catching fish and building the boats he took to sea – each named “The Dream Girl.”

“I built six of them in all, the first in 1976,” Baum continued. “And I’m still owner of the last one, a 57-foot Dream Girl that Jason Snead runs for me out of Oregon Inlet Fishing Center.”

Baum retired in 2004.

Of all the great trips Baum’s estimated 60,000 charter clients experienced offshore, he rates a day filled with bigeye tuna as the most memorable. “We boated eight of them in all, weighing between 175 and 250 pounds. We had multiple hookups. It got real exciting.”

Baum’s customers caught many big blue marlin off Oregon Inlet. “I’m not sure what the biggest one was, because we released them all. But I guess around 600 pounds,” he said.

Baum is the second Oregon Inlet skipper to be chosen for the IGFA’s legends list. Omie Tillett was a charter inductee in 2011. Tom Higgins

Catches of the week

▪  Approximately 100 Lake Norman hybrids by Shannon Miller while trolling an Alabama rig near the Plant Marshall hot hole. N.C. Wildlife Resources fishery biologist Ken Baker was along and tagged 20 of the fish as the agency begins a research program on how the stocked species is doing in Norman. The commission has posted rewards of $100 for each returned tag and pertinent information about the catch – the fish’s size, where taken, bait used and so forth. TH

▪  Three Lake Wateree catfish weighing a total of 71.6 pounds by Clay Henderson of Fort Mill and Jason Henderson of Rock Hill. The catch enabled the duo to win the Catawba Catfish Club’s third tournament of the season, topping anglers in 28 other boats and earning $2,800. The team of Brandon Miller of Gold Hill and Justin Barger of Gastonia finished second with 66 pounds and collected $720. Very muddy waters conditions limited the bite. TH

▪  Eighteen Lake Norman hybrids in the 19-22 inch range by the father-son duo of Eric and Jeremy Beggarly. They hooked the fish while trolling swimming lures 40 feet deep on lead core line. The fish were released.

▪  Striped bass of 45, 44 and 35 pounds by Mooresville fishermen David Clubb, David Parlee, and brothers Michael and Stephen Hobbs while fishing in Chesapeake Bay on the Virginia side. They also boated several smaller stripers. All were released.

This story was originally published January 13, 2016 at 4:45 PM with the headline "IGFA to honor Oregon Inlet skipper Billy Baum."