Here we present the first results of WATCHBOY, a water Cherenkov detector designed to measure the yield of $beta$-neutron emitting radionuclides produced by cosmic ray muons in water. In addition to the $beta$-neutron measurement, we also provide a first look at isolating single-$beta$ producing radionuclides following muon-induced hadronic showers as a check of the detection capabilities of WATCHBOY. The data taken over $207$ live days indicates a $^{9}$Li production yield upper limit of $1.9times10^{-7}mu^{-1}g^{-1}mathrm{cm}^2$ at $sim400$ meters water equivalent (m.w.e.) overburden at the $90%$ confidence level. In this work the $^{9}$Li signal in WATCHBOY was used as a proxy for the combined search for $^{9}$Li and $^{8}$He production. This result will provide a constraint on estimates of antineutrino-like backgrounds in future water-based antineutrino detectors.
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