HOW DOES A PERSON END UP RUNNING A CHARTER BOAT IN HAWAII CHASING BLUE MARLIN ON NATIONAL TELEVISION?
If you ask Norm, he will say “That’s what I had to do because I couldn’t hold down a real job”. Actually, Norm says he doesn’t remember his first fishing experiences. “From what I’m told, my dad used to tie a rope around me and around his waist and that’s how we’d spend the day up and down the Kansas river banks. I guess as a little guy I tended to go where I shouldn’t from time to time.”
From years as a general freshwater fishing enthusiast, Norm evolved into an obsessive bass fanatic. He chased around the bass tournaments (of which there weren’t many at that time) until he was severely bitten by the big game bug in the late 60’s fishing with his dad and his brother off the South Texas Coast. It was primarily billfish with bass on the side until billfish finally won out. Norm spent a couple of years fishing points south such as Mexico and Panama with some time in the West Indies.
Settling in South Padre Island, Texas, Norm skippered offshore trips until the lure of the big fish off Hawaiiís famous Kona Coast caused him to move his charter operation there in the early 80's, fishing Kona some 225 days a year. Over the years, Norm has racked up an impressive record of more than 30 wins and placings in Hawaiiís fishing tournaments and has been written up both nationally and internationally numerous times for some of his notable catches and innovative ideas pertaining to offshore fishing.
Norm is a member of the International Game Fish Association as well as The Billfish Foundation and the Outdoor Writers Association of America. He is a strong advocate of conservation and frequently promotes the billfish tag and release program on his weekly ESPN shows. Norm is also a published writer with monthly articles appearing in a variety of publications ranging from Sportfishing, Marlin magazines and Hawaii Fishing News to ESPN.com and BigGameFishingTheWorld.com.
While fishing has been an integral part of Norm’s life from early childhood on, team sports took the spotlight for a while. Upon graduating high school at Benton, Kansas in 1962, he signed a professional baseball contract with the New York Yankees, and started college in the off season. According to Norm, “When I was with the Yankees, I was a small frog in a big puddle, but I got acquainted with and got to hang out with some of the big frogs like Mantle and some of the other big names of the game at that time. That, along with playing the game, was a lot of fun”. An injury sent Norm back to follow in his father’s footsteps in general aviation working as a flight instructor/charter pilot. Interrupted temporarily by a hitch in the military, flying in one form or another, paid for the next fishing trip for several years. In fact, between fishing charters, it was delivering an airplane to Hawaii that first exposed Norm to the magic of the Kona Coast and resulted in the move 6 weeks later.
In late 1986, Norm began putting forth an effort to develop such shows as “Big Game Fishing The World”, “Big Game Bites”, “Billfishing Xtreme Release League” and “Inside Big Game Fishing” and has since become a longtime partner with ESPN.