Some fishing traditions are passed down with the tackle box. On Dauphin Island, one of them has now reached a third generation. At the 2022 Roy Martin Young Anglers Tournament, a young angler named Maggie, visiting from Auburn for the weekend, brought home first place in the Blackfish category with a 21-pound fish, fishing alongside her grandfather, Harris Brown, and his son, Radcliff. It was a win decades in the making, and for the families who have fished these waters together for years, it meant far more than a trophy.
A 16-Foot Stauter and a Pair of Flip-Flops
The story begins years earlier, when Harris Brown and a close friend were high school and college students fishing around Dauphin Island in Brown’s 16-foot Stauter. By his friend’s own admission, Brown was always the better fisherman, and it was his boat.
The friend had a summer construction job, so the two would drive to the island and fish in the late afternoons. They had a standing arrangement. The friend bought the gas, and Brown charged a pair of flip-flops for each of them at Ben Burgers so they could avoid the sand spurs when launching and retrieving the boat. Anyone who has walked barefoot across a sandy Gulf Coast boat launch knows the deal was well worth it.
Learning the Blackfish Game
Brown later upgraded to a 21-foot Negus, a boat that was famous and prized in those days along Mobile Bay. With it, he started fishing for blackfish, the local name for tripletail, around the channel markers in the Mississippi Sound, along the Mobile Bay ship channel, and in the Intracoastal Waterway between Dauphin Island and Bon Secour.
The technique back then was simple and demanding. They used long, sturdy Calcutta cane poles, a six-foot wire leader and large dead shrimp. One person drove the boat while the other stood on the bow with the pole, trying to present the bait in exactly the right spot. It did not take long to know whether a fish was lurking, so they covered miles and miles of water, running from one buoy to the next. At the time, not many people went blackfishing, and Brown got very good at it.
Tripletail are among the most distinctive fish on the Gulf Coast. Named for their rounded dorsal and anal fins, which extend back alongside the tail and give the appearance of three tails, they have a habit of floating near the surface beside structure such as buoys, channel markers, pilings, crab trap floats and floating debris. They often lie on their sides, looking remarkably like a drifting leaf or a piece of trash, which is part of their camouflage. That behavior is exactly why anglers “run the markers,” moving from structure to structure and scanning for a fish holding in the shadow.
Blackfish are also prized as table fare, with firm, white, mild meat, which helps explain why the fishery has grown so much more popular over the years. Anglers today should check current Alabama Marine Resources regulations for size and bag limits before keeping any fish.
The Dauphin Island Young Anglers Tradition
Both men fished the Dauphin Island Young Anglers tournament while growing up. It was a big deal, especially if you won. Later, after both had children of their own, they took their kids fishing in the DIYAT, as it was known at the time, and won the Blackfish category three years in a row. Brown’s friend still counts it among his fondest memories.
The event, now known as the Roy Martin Young Anglers Tournament, has long been one of the signature summer traditions on Dauphin Island. It gives young people a chance to compete across a range of species categories, and for many coastal families it is a rite of passage that parents and grandparents remember from their own childhoods. Tournaments like this one play an important role in passing on fishing knowledge, ethics and a love of the outdoors to the next generation.
Since those early days, the boats and equipment have been upgraded dramatically, and far more people chase blackfish than ever before. Brown’s friend does not fish as much these days, but Brown is hard at it almost every weekend. He and his wife now live on the island.
A 21-Pound Win on the First Marker
In July 2022, Brown’s granddaughter, Maggie, came down from Auburn for the weekend of the Roy Martin Young Anglers Tournament. Brown and his son, Radcliff, entered her in the competition.
They won first place in the Blackfish category. The winning fish weighed 21 pounds, and they landed it on the very first marker they fished. For a family that had been running markers in the Sound for decades, it was a fitting result, and for Brown’s old fishing partner, it was proof of something he had long believed.
“And the tradition continues,” he wrote. “Congratulations Maggie!”
Dauphin Island: A Fishing Destination With Deep Roots
The win fits into a much larger story. Dauphin Island, the barrier island at the mouth of Mobile Bay, has drawn anglers for generations. Its position between Mobile Bay, the Mississippi Sound and the Gulf of Mexico creates a rich mix of habitats, from grass flats and oyster reefs to deep channels and nearshore structure.
The island is also home to one of the region’s best-known fishing events, the Alabama Deep Sea Fishing Rodeo, held each July and often billed as one of the largest fishing tournaments in the world. Along with the Young Anglers tournament, it helps make summer on Dauphin Island a season built around fishing.
Beyond tournaments, the island offers:
- Historic Fort Gaines, which guarded the entrance to Mobile Bay during the Civil War Battle of Mobile Bay in 1864
- The Dauphin Island Sea Lab and its Estuarium, a public aquarium focused on coastal habitats
- The Audubon Bird Sanctuary, a key stop for migratory birds crossing the Gulf each spring and fall
- Public beaches, piers and boat launches for anglers of every skill level
Passing It On
Ask almost any lifelong Gulf Coast angler how they learned, and you will hear a version of this story: a parent, a grandparent or a friend with a boat, a long afternoon on the water, and a few tricks passed along one trip at a time. Cane poles have given way to modern rods, and 16-foot boats to much larger ones, but the basic idea has not changed.
For the Brown family, a pair of flip-flops, a borrowed boat and a lot of buoy-hopping in the Mississippi Sound eventually led to three straight Blackfish titles with one generation and a first-place finish with the next. If you are thinking about introducing a young person to fishing, a youth tournament is a great place to start. Check with tournament organizers for current dates, rules and age divisions, make sure everyone has a proper fishing license where required, and remember that the most important catch is the memory.