Frank Mundus - Colorful Character

Colorful Character

Mundus' reputation was enhanced by his eccentric personality and ostentatious displays of the killed sharks (something he would say later he regretted). "He always said the charter business was 90 percent show and 10 percent go," said Chris Miller, a Montauk resident who had seen him on the docks. He colored his big toenails red and green for port and starboard. He wore a hoop earring and an Australian slouch hat and a shark tooth necklace.

In 2005, he appeared in a Shark Week documentary "Shark Hunter: Chasing the Great White" which was narrated by actor Roy Scheider who played Martin Brody in Jaws and Jaws II. The special told of Frank's early career, how he became the inspiration for Quint, his world record capture, and how he turned from shark hunter to shark conservationist. Frank also joined Chris Fallows and other Shark conservationists in viewing great whites in their natural habitat. In one such viewing of the breaching Great Whites (made famous in the "Air Jaws" series of specials) along with Chris Fallows, during which Chris brought out a seal decoy he had humorously named "Frank" after Mundus (a hat like the ones Mundus usually wore was even added to it) and they used it to fool them into breaching.

He said that the cricket name was inspired because his profile resembled that of Jiminy Cricket.

He made appearances on David Letterman and Larry King.