1988... salmon fishing in 30 ft of water right infront of the tillamook bay South jetty in a 17' smoker craft, I was 8.. fishing blue label plug cut herring, rod went down in normal salmon fasion.. bob bob bob down she goes..... started rippin line, thought we hooked into a trophy king... line kept running no sign of where it was going, just DOWN!!! line STOPPED at 3 raps from the knot at the end of the spool, made about 30 yds of progress... back to spool knot... this went on for over an hour, passed rod around the boat with still no progress, by this time we were clear out drifted with current over to about 5 miles south of the jetty and tide turned goin out. line still below us.... Fought the thing some more... until i couldnt even hold the pole... dad was holding the poll, my other "dad" steve was helping me reel it in.. we were sure we had a 60+ lb chinook.... the fish came into view.... wasn't a salmon..... wasn't a sturgeon...... it was a 150lb + halibut......
needless to say we didnot get to keep it... for several reasons.... it was to big to safely bring aboard our little boat, out of season, and nobody really knew what to do with it....
but this little 8 yr old punk kid on 20lb maxima with a 6/0 hook succeeded in catching the largest fish in the family and that fish still holds the family size record...