Alfred C. Glassell, Jr., on August 4, 1953, in Cabo Blanco, Peru, with his world record rod and reel Black Marlin.

Every big game fishing catch has a big game fishing story, and the biggest are the Black Marlin of Cabo Blanco, Peru.

Col. C. J. Tippett was the Director of the Cabo Blanco Fishing Club in 1953, when Alfred C. Glassell, Jr., caught the world-record black marlin on rod and reel on August 4th, 1953. Tip was present at the Club, although not on the boat. He had hooked several black marlin of his own, but none as big as this one.
No one else has hooked one as big as that since then either!  Glassell’s record still stands.

Big fish stories are notorious for their re-telling, and it just gets better when other people’s perspectives of the day can be collected and shared. Tip was on the sidelines for that catch, and he remembered it for the rest of his life. He described it three years later in a letter to his air force reserve commander:

“To Col. Samuel Galbreath,
Director, Operations Headquarters
Caribbean Air Command
Albrook AFB, Panama CZ

Dear Sam,

I had expected to be up to see you before this but we’ve been overwhelmed by work….” (I’ve cut out two paragraphs here of Tip’s letter to feature in an upcoming post about flying and ICAO and CairC…) … “I trust Mary is fine and that you are bearing up under the rigors of the tropics. I spent a couple of days at Cabo Blanco a short time ago and fished for the studio group who were filming “The Old Man And The Sea” and hooked into a new world’s record fish that we estimated at 1800 – 2000 lbs. The Warner Bros boys tell me it looks real pretty in cinemascope. It jumped several times about 40 ft. from the boat.

Hoping to see you soon, best wishes,

CJ Tippett”

The black marlin was actually 1560 lbs, and the “short time ago” was three years previously, but that’s normal for a fish tale.

The rest of the story of Tip’s time in Cabo Blanco, and why the Warner Brothers film crew was at the Club that day, and his work as Director of the South American Office of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), and more, is coming very soon now – as I finish the final edits on Tip’s biography When No One Else Would Fly. To sign up for the book release notification, simply contact us. We never sell our readership lists.