The World's Biggest Catfish

I want to be able to tell the stories that have been told to me. I do this in hopes that they will never be forgotten, and neither will the folks who told them. The following is a story told by my Uncle. He was a professional story spinner, fisherman, hunter, trader, etc. His name was Louie Smith and he was from the blip on the Map called Crump, TN.

We were drifting down the Tennessee River, fishing for the ever so popular catfish. Though the day had produced a few small catfish, it seemed to be dragging. I asked “Uncle Louie, reckon the fish are bigger up near the dam?” To which he responded “Yep. But the boilers under the dam make it too dangerous for us to fish.”

Seeing my obvious disappointment he spoke up, “I use to fish up there all the time. As a matter of fact, that is where I caught one of the biggest fish ever caught in Pickwick. You see right after that dam was built, it didn’t have any guard rails. It was just open road and you had to stay off the edges. Somebody pushed an old Plymouth car off of it one day, just to watch it sink. Well I was fishing down there when it happened. I was a much younger man, and I knew that wherever that car came to rest on the bottom, would be a good hiding place for big catfish in the future.”

“Wait” I interrupted “Who pushes a perfectly good car off a bridge?” He thought for a minute. “Well, it wasn’t running. Didn’t have a motor or transmission, just an ole’ scrapper.”

“Oh. Ok” I responded.

“Well a few years later, I was around the dam fishing. I remembered that ole Plymouth car. I drove my boat to where I thought it had came to rest and went to fishing.” He continued. “As I bumped bottom, I was feeling for that car. Now right there, in that area, it is probably sixty or seventy foot deep. So it was hard to find, but I found it. I bumped my bait up the side of the car, around the front, and back down the other side. Didn’t get one bite. But then I brought er’ back around to the driver’s side and raised it up about window height. Sure enough WAM! Big un’ done latched on! Not much fight, just laid there. He had to weigh at least 150 pounds.”

“WOW!” I said in amazement. “How did you get him in the boat? Did you eat him? Do you have a picture?”

Louie started to laugh, knowing I had taken the bait. “Well” he said as he leaned back in the boat “I couldn’t get him in. You see about the time I set the hook, the ole’ fish just eased back in the car and rolled the window up.”

Probably one of my favorite stories of my Uncle Louie.