Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-01-23

from diplomacy He Strove to put the
lighter thoughts out of his head. He
was on battleShip, en- route to foreign
lands on a very serious mission. Fish
ing had no part in the program, it
seemed.
Finds Cape San Lucas.
Going below, he turned his attention
to maps. Assisted by Capt. Kimberly
and Ambassador Fletcher, he took a
pencil and traced the course of the
ship. The Maryland was paraleling
the barren, rugged coast of Lower
California-that long finger of Mexican
territory separated from the mainland
by the Gulf of California. In a day
or so the ship would be off Cape San
Lucas, Southernmost tip of the Lower
California peninsula.
Cape San Lucas?
There was something familiar about
the sound of that name. Unless the
memory of the former Secretary of
Commerce failed him, and it seldom
does, an expedition from the Bureau of
Fisheries had caught 700pound mar
lin off Cape San Lucas about year
ago.
They did it with line no thicker
than a butchers string" Hoover in
formed his friends, with enthusiasm.
And it required Ia hours to land him!"
1t was the last straw. There was no
escaping the urge. A-fishing he must go
off Cape San Lucas. Hoover asked
the captain about it and that officer,
ever ready to please the distinguished
guest, agreed it could be done. The
ship could be speeded up to II knots
so that no delay would result in the
schedule. Orders were issued &C
cordingly.
Anchors Just to Fish.
That Cape San Lucas fishing expe-
dition stands out as the most remark
able in piscatorial history. Never
before had a 30,000-ton battleship al
tered its course and come to anchor for
the sole purpose of permitting one of
its passengers to indulge in a recrea-
tional Whim
The Maryland arrived off the lonely
jagged tip of the Mexican cape early
in the afternoon Of November %. Three
small motorboatS were put over the
side. Into one of them climbed the
President-elect and Mark Sullivan, one
of the veteran anglers of the press con-
tingent. Several rods and lines were
put on board. Into the second boat
men rated as fishing eXperts-Phil
Kinsley and Ned Mcintosh. The third
boat was for the secret service men
for they must keep on the trail of
1.-THE chief" even though he were en-
gagged in so harmless a pastime as that
made famous by IZaak Walton.
The boats SWiShed away and sought
out likely looking spot a few hundred
yards off the bleak Shoreline. Hoover
ventured the opinion that somewhere
in the vicinity he would cut across the
path used by the finny inhabitants of
the deep in journeying back and forth
between the Gulf of California and the
Pacific Ocean.
Hoover Lands Dolphin.
Using a spinner he had bought in
San Francisco, he tried his luck at
several points before he decided to
change his bait. He substituted a sill
yer minnow for the spinner. 1t was
just what a hungry dolphin down there
near the boat had been looking for.
After battle Of less than Is minutes
the President-elect landed his first
catch. Much elated, he tried again and
before long had hooked another vic
tim, this time big mackerel. On the
third try the Hoover and Sullivan
lIALCo 1IdOC SOI1hSo anu
then became entangled. The Hoover
line broke, but Sullivan reeled in a
yard-long dolphin.
BY this time the orange sun was
sinking below the gold-mottled Pacific
and it was agreed. somewhat reluctant
ly on Hoover's part, to call it day.
The other boats were given the signal
to return to the ship. Akerson and Nc
Intosh had just succeeded in landing
pair of bonitas, so there were no
regrets.