Derby days: The happiest season of all

1 of 3

Hold the snow, cue Andy Williams singing, “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.”  

For many fishermen, the most wonderful time of the year begins at 12:01 on Sunday morning. 

The Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby could certainly be called “the hap, happiest season of all.” Fishermen from near and far gather on the Vineyard to fish for 35 days. 

And there are always “tales of the glories of Derbies long, long ago.”

I was chatting with Derby icon Janet Messineo-Israel recently. She fished her first Derby in 1976. 

“It’s my 48th year. Can you believe it?” Janet said with wonder and pride. “My most prestigious award was in 1998, when I took second place for the Shore Grand Slam. After that I tried so hard to get first place, and I couldn’t catch a bonito. They disappeared,” said Janet, who like many shore fishermen spent about 18 years casting for the then elusive bonito and coming up empty.

Janet’s office is filled with Derby awards — pins and trophies that tell the story of a woman who loves to fish and who fished well. Her physical health has impeded her fishing in recent years, but Janet’s most cherished Derby memory happened only two years ago. 

“I wasn’t having a great Derby. I’d only weighed in one small albie. On the last day of the Derby, I took my friend Young Cho and his son John to Chappy. As we drove down East Beach toward the Wasque rip, I could see the crowd fishing at the point. I didn’t want to bring my friends into that crowd. We stopped at a very calm spot where I had caught many fish.

“I was taking a cast occasionally, but not with the passion that I once had. John was casting with his 7-foot Tsunami rod with 20-pound braid line and a Savage Glass Minnow. Suddenly, John was on with what we thought might be a big albacore. Then the fish breached, and we realized it was a bluefish. A very large bluefish.

“Young waded into the water to help his son. I was barking, ‘Get out of the water! Don’t touch his line, it will disqualify the fish!’”

John landed that 15.02-pound blue, and then stood on stage to claim first place in the Junior Shore Bluefish division. “It was such a thrill. It made my whole Derby,” said Janet.

Thinking of the Derby award stage, I can’t help but recall 2016 when Ed Amaral landed the largest boat bluefish at a whopping 17.83 pounds. Without a doubt, Ed was the crowd favorite. As he stood on stage, I think all of us in the audience were willing his key to open the lock to the new truck.

During the second week of the Derby, Ed went out fishing with Steve Purcell. “We were out there in his boat off Nantucket. I got the fish in the boat, and Steve said, ‘Dude, you got a Derby winner.’ I said, ‘No way,’” remembered Ed, who fished his first Derby in 1946.

Seventy years later, Ed, who was 81 in 2016, took the stage for the first time as a Grand Leader: “I was so nervous. I was shaking. I couldn’t believe it. I said to myself, No way. I had the first key. I looked at Ed Jerome and he looked at me, and he winked. We both smiled, and I turned the key. I about fell on the floor when the lock opened,” said Ed, adding, “I couldn’t believe it. My better half Lois was in the audience crying.”  

Ed still has the truck, and he’ll be out fishing the Derby on Sunday, hoping for another winner. “The anticipation every time going into the Derby, hoping you catch a big fish, hoping you catch a winner, it never changes,” said Ed.

I’m looking forward to catching fish, and hoping, like all Derby fishermen, to catch a winning fish, but what I love the most about the Derby are the moments and memories with friends.

I have so many wonderful friends who fish the Derby. Sharing five weeks with them is magical in more ways than I have words in my column to express. When I texted my teammate Dave this morning to show him the big fish I landed on the fly, we both laughed at the tiny peanut bunker, but immediately switched to Derby strategies and dreams for the coming five weeks.

At the end of our conversation, Dave beautifully summed up the reason we fish the Derby: “The Derby moment that always seems front and center is the feeling of getting off the ferry and hitting sacred Island ground. The second you hit the Island during the Derby, you know instantly you are now part of an amazing event with amazing people. The feeling cannot be described or done justice with words. True Derby fishermen know exactly what it is, and it never leaves you even when the Derby has ended!”

I hope to see you on the beach during the Derby, and I hope we’re bathed in the 

Derby glow of fellowship with friends and fish, and singing, “It’s the hap, happiest season of all.”