The White Marlin Open by the numbers, 1974 to now

The tournament is fifty-three years old. The reason it exists here is ninety-two: in 1934 the Townsend brothers found the Jackspot, the offshore lump about twenty miles out that holds fish, and the same year somebody boated Ocean City's first rod-and-reel marlin — a 71-pounder, in late August, with two versions of who deserves the credit still on the record.

• 1934 — the Jackspot is found, and the first rod-and-reel marlin comes in at 71 pounds
• 1951 — a record 266 marlin for the season, and a 500-pound blue fights the Ella Ex for six hours
• 1981 — Ron Evans's 90-pounder tops the 8th Open
• 2001 — the 28th Open becomes a Rolex/IGFA Offshore Championship qualifier
• 2011 — 237 boats; Paul Coen's 88.5-pounder aboard Wee Wun IV
• 2021 — 444 boats, a $9.2 million purse, and a $3.24 million world-record payout settled in the last thirty minutes
• 2026 — 334 boats, about $9.9 million, and an 80-pound fish worth $3,503,891.54

White Marlin OpenEvery August, and the one week a year the town's harbour is the story.

Two things are worth noticing in that list. The winning fish has not got much bigger — 90 pounds in 1981, 80 pounds in 2026 — while the money has gone up by three orders of magnitude, because the purse is entry fees and calcuttas rather than anything about the ocean. And the boat count peaked in 2021 and has come down since, which is a fact about the cost of running a sportfisher, not about the fish.

Every dated line above comes from this guide's own year-facts file, each with its own source; the 2026 figures are the tournament's published board. This item carries no advertising, which is the rule for anything filed under history here.