This article first appeared in the September issue of the South Mountain District News
From the time Bill Wittmann was a little boy he’s been pretty much been obsessed with fishing. He spends most of his summers escaping the Valley heat to try his hand at various fishing locales near Greer.
This summer the longtime Laveen resident and his grandson netted themselves a pretty good catch in July. He hooked a 30-inch, 7 pound, 14 ounce, rainbow trout while fishing in the River Reservoir in Greer. The massive fish was 18 inches around.
While not a state record, it was good enough to win the state’s July Trout Challenge. Wittman, 73, said the last time he was in the newspaper was when he was little boy and The Phoenix Gazette ran a picture of him with, you guessed it, a big fish he caught.