George Perry & His Record Largemouth Bass

Over the years there have been challengers & pretenders, but the record stands.

Fall 2025

By Bill Baab

Editor’s Note: For a period of years, the International Game Fish Association recognized Manabu Kurita’s 22-pound, 5-ounce bass from Lake Biwa in Japan as having tied George Perry’s record. However, they now recognize that fish as the world record for Florida largemouth bass due to testing that identified the two species as being genetically distinct.

Funny things happened to world record bass wannabes on the way to reality during the 93-year period following George W. Perry’s catch.

There have been a line of claimants wanting to be king (or queen) on the largemouth throne, not to mention outright hoaxes written in fun, but stirring the wrath of folks who take the 22-pound, 4-ounce record seriously.

The only known photo of George Perry’s bass, though the identity of the man and boy in the photo remain unknown.

Then there are stories that could be true, but blocked by extenuating circumstances.

Such was one case in 1984. Otis Broom of Meansville, Georgia caught a largemouth bass reportedly weighing 22 pounds, 3.25 ounces in a private pond, fishing after dark to beat the heat on August 22. He caught it at 1 a.m.

“I just wanted to take it home, get the meat out and have it mounted,” Broom told a newspaper reporter, “but friends convinced me to notify the Game and Fish Commission and get it certified as a possible record.”

Broom kept the big fish alive with the help of an aerator and then affixed to a stringer in the pond behind his home. Later that morning, Broom took the fish to the Piggly Wiggly store in nearby Thomaston and weighed on the certified produce scale. He had two witnesses sign an affidavit to the effect that the scale’s dial showed 22 pounds, 3.25 ounces.

The fisherman contacted the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and an appointment with Fisheries Biologist Frank Ellis of Manchester was scheduled. Word got out and a media circus invaded Broom’s home in tiny Meansville.

He had gone to work after weighing the fish and receptionists at the plant estimated more than 1,000 phone calls were made between 8 a.m. and noon on August 24. Broom refused to speak with any of the callers. He left work at noon and arrived home to find two new helicopters on the ground and a third hovering overhead. Some 50 to 60 cars and trucks of other media representatives were parked on his property and that of his neighbors, according to a story in the Pike County Journal & Reporter.

Broom took the cooler holding the fish into his home to find his wife, Jeanie, and new baby Kirsten crying. “I’m used to coming home and finding my wife smiling and my baby sleeping,” he said. The family’s unlisted telephone number had rung all morning. Sporting goods manufacturers were calling to offer Broom thousands of dollars for his endorsement of their products, the news story said.

Not used to all the attention and frustrated by what he considered invasion of his privacy, Broom quickly ended the drama. He pulled the bass from the cooler, filleted it and popped the meat into the oven and he and family members ate the whole thing.

John B. Lukens, an advertising executive for a Muncie, Indiana firm, told the Muncie Star columnist Bob Barnet the strange story of a potential world record bass. Lukins, who also handled advertising for the old Creek Chub Bait Company in Garrett, Indiana, sent a copy of Barnet’s December 4, 1974, column to this writer in the mid-1980s.

Here’s the story told by Lukens.

“In April of 1974, Raymond V. Tomer, a Florida retiree recently transplanted from Pennsylvania, caught a largemouth bass from East Lake Tohopekaliga near Orlando that he claimed weighed 24 pounds, 13 ounces, a full two and a half pounds heavier than the official world record for the species,” Lukens said. “The fish struck a dark-colored plastic worm.”

“The weight, length and girth of the fish were verified in writing by Tomer’s fishing partner and two other persons and entered in the Florida State Fishing Contest. The catch was also reported to the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission on April 20. For some unexplained reason, the entry lay all summer in commission files, undiscovered until a few weeks ago. Naturally, the state agency conducted an intensive investigation in he hope of authenticating the Tomer largemouth as a new record for the state, not to mention the world.

“Following the investigation, the agency decided that Tomer would not get a citation for these reasons: (1) Lack of any remains of the fish, (2) indefinite photographic evidence and (3) inconclusive evidence of true weight, length and girth measurements.

“Tomer claimed that he had attempted to preserve the bass in his trailer ice chest, but the fish was so large, he had no way of closing the lid after putting the fish into the chest. He then filleted the fish, but when he tried to cook it discovered the meat had spoiled. As many fishermen do, he has nailed the head to a post, but raccoons ate it during the night.

“Tomer and his witnesses claimed that the Florida bass measured 39 1/2 inches from lip to tail and 30 inches in girth. One of America’s leading angling experts has stated that, if the measurements were true, the fish would have weighed at least 35 pounds.

“While it is evident that Tomer had indeed caught a monster bass, it was too bad he lacked the knowledge that just might have enabled him to prove that he was the champion fisherman of all time.”

When April Fool’s Day rolls around each year, some writers and publications think nothing of faking a world record catch, doing it so well that gullible readers believe the tales.

The March/April 1997 issue of Sporting Classics magazine published out of Columbia, South Carolina featured a story claiming it to be an exclusive interview with a man who caught a bass reportedly weighing 22 pounds, 8 ounces “from an oxbow lake off the Savannah River” on the South Carolina side.

George Perry holding another bass he caught that was not a world record.

Mike Creel, information chief of the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, phoned this writer, asking, “Have you heard about the new world record bass? It weighed about 25 pounds and was supposed to have been caught in South Carolina, but we know nothing about it.”

When this writer checked with the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society, he quickly learned the facts, or fiction. The magazine story was loaded with inaccuracies and was nothing more than an April Fool’s prank. The only “catch” was that readers weren’t going to be told until the next issue!

Last April 1, 2024, a story with a Rollick, CA (April 1) dateline appeared online, claiming a man named “Marc Delair” caught a 23-pound, 9-ounce bass from “Fiction Lake” in northern California. That hoax was much easier to detect than the one in Sporting Classics.

Just think: If Field & Stream magazine had not been conducting a big fish contest in 1932 and George W. Perry had caught his bass, it would have just been another big fish for him to brag about. It would not have been placed on any world record lists, even if any had been established later, so there would be nothing to talk or write about along those lines. At least, not about that bass.

Bill Baab retired after serving as the fishing editor of the Augusta Chronicle newspaper for 60 years. He is a life member of the Georgia Outdoor Writers Association and the acknowledged expert on George Perry and his world record largemouth bass. Bill continues to make his home in Augusta. He can be contacted at riverswamper@comcast.net.