Bill Smith's Bait Farm Keeps Fishermen in Worms, Minnows, July 8, 1926

“Bait” Farm. . . Raleigh Boy Saw an Opportunity to Make a Little Pocket Money

Raleigh, July 7—Have you ever started to go fishing, and then have to give it up because you could not find any worms for bait?

That has been the predicament of many would-be fishermen this spring as the result of the long drought. But in Raleigh it is now possible to go fishing any time, as far as bait is concerned, for Raleigh now boasts a “fishing worm farm.”

The worm farm fist came into being as the result of the activities of one William Howard Smith, better known as “Bill,” 17 years old, who lives on North Blount street. Bill, noting the scarcity of bait during the long spring, saw an opportunity to make a little pocket money by securing a supply of worms from nearby swampy places and retailing them to his friends and acquaintances at so much for a glassful. And although Bill had laid in a stock of several thousand red, slimy wrigglers, word soon got around among the Waltonians and Bill had more orders than he could fill.

And that set Bill to figuring. If worms have a ready market as bait, why not minnows as well? So Bill started getting minnows from pools in streams in the vicinity and selling them, too. And trade has been so brisk that Bill, assisted by his father, has just completed the most modern equipment for his worm and minnow farm, located in his backyard.

The minnow “farm” consists of a large concrete “pond,” where the minnows are brought and kept alive until sold for bait. A pump has been sunk near this to provide well water for them, as the city water, with its chemical treatment, is not good for the minnows. And adjoining this minnow pond is the worm “farm,” another concrete creation filled with good, black, cozy, sticky, slimy mud—a regular worm’s heaven—in which the thousands of wriggling, ruddy fish food will gaily disport themselves until time to be harpooned on a hook. This “mud bath” is replenished from time to time from the secret “worm mines’ in the swamps that only Bill knows.

“Yes, business is good,” says Bill.

From page 3 of the Concord Daily Tribune, Thursday, July 8, 1926

newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073201/1926-07-08/ed-1/seq-3/