Frank Mundus, RIP

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Captain Frank Mundus passed away in Hawaii, at the age of 82. I met him once, at a sportsman's expo in 1981, and I can tell you that he truly was Captain Quint

 

Famed shark hunter Frank Mundus dead at 82

by The Associated Press

Monday September 15, 2008, 11:48 AM

HONOLULU - Frank Mundus, the legendary Long Island shark fisherman said to have inspired the Captain Quint character in the movie "Jaws," has died. He was 82.

 

Mundus forged his reputation as a fearless fisherman in Montauk beginning in 1951, hunting down the world's biggest sharks.

 

He died Wednesday at The Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu after a heart attack, his wife said.

 

 

It was his second heart attack in four days. He suffered the earlier one Sept. 6 at Kona International Airport after returning from a business trip to New York.

 

Mundus had a history of heart disease, his wife, Jeanette Mundus, 46, said from their home in Naalehu on the southern tip of the Big Island. He suffered his first heart attack in 1998 and later had quadruple bypass surgery.

 

Known as the "Monster Man" for the size of the sharks he caught, the gregarious Mundus had an outsized personality nearly as big as his famed boat, the Cricket II.

 

"I had a lot of close calls," he once said. "Probably too many close calls."

 

In 1964, Mundus used a harpoon to snag a 4,500-pound great white. He later bagged a 17-foot-long, 3,427-pound great white by rod and reel in 1986. He later described the experience to Esquire magazine.

 

"After you get the fish, you turn around and look at the fish, and you feel sorry for the fish because he's your opponent," Mundus recalled. "I always feel good that I won, but I feel sorry for the one who lost."

 

On his Web site, Mundus said events from the 1964 catch influenced Peter Benchley, who wrote "Jaws." But Benchley maintained that Quint was a composite character.

 

The best-selling book was turned into the 1975 film, a blockbuster that left many beachgoers thinking twice about taking a dip in the ocean. Actor Roy Scheider, who lived near Montauk and played the police chief in the film, died in February.

 

Although he retired to Hawaii in 1991, Mundus remained a frequent visitor to Montauk, and attended a shark fishing tournament there earlier this summer.

 

Stret Whitting, president of the Montauk Boatmen & Captain's Association, said in an interview before the tournament that he first met Mundus when he and some friends hired him to take them shark fishing in the 1960s.

 

"Mundus was the guy that started it, and this was before 'Jaws,'" Whitting recalled. "He was the guy that got it going and made it popular."

 

Mundus, who was born in Long Branch, N.J. in 1925, called "Jaws" the "funniest and the stupidest" movie he had ever seen and said he had some things in common with Quint such as similar fishing techniques.

 

Jeanette Mundus said her husband actively promoted shark conservation starting in the 1960s. He pushed the use of less damaging hook varieties that allow fishermen to catch and release the fish.

 

"A lot of people over the years have thought of him just as a hunter of sharks," Jeanette Mundus said. "But he did try to preserve them."

 

 

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2008/09/f...rank_mundu.html