Littlesaltwash
Well-Known Member
I don’t remember seeing a thread like this on WW before but thought it might make for fun winter reading to hear others’ stories. While I had tackle strewn all over the living and dining room the other day trying to figure out what to do with it all, I thought back to how I got into this predicament. My folks and extended family didn’t fish at all when I was growing up. An old man at our church conspired with my mom and dad and a fishing trip was planned. Clarence had two ponds on his farm, aptly named The Big Pond and The Little Pond. After church one Sunday I went home with Clarence and Miriam to be introduced to fishing. We went up to The Little Pond where the bluegills were always willing to cooperate. I was hooked! Clarence and Miriam didn’t have any kids and I must have been just the distraction they needed thank goodness. I was able to go with Clarence for years while I was little. It evolved into me burning up the roads on my bike fishing the creeks and farm ponds within miles fishing with rooster tails, Mepps spinners, and Rapalas. (One story highlighting a different time and place because I can’t imagine it happening today.) By the time I was in high school I was a died in the wool wanna be bass fisherman. My fishing buddy, a kid one year older than me, and I got permission to go south by ourselves to Watts Bar in Tennessee on an Easter Break for some bass and crappie fishing. We arrived at a lake landing late at night and went to sleep in the car waiting for daylight. We were awakened early the next morning by commotion right outside of the car. There must have been 50 people within 20 or 30 feet from us attending an Easter Sunrise Service there at the edge of the lake. The thought never crossed our minds of getting out of the car and interrupting them. We stayed there inside the car, must have been days, waiting for the service to end. The only sound breaking the the sunrise was the sermon and hymms. All was quiet until the last hymn was sung and the final amen. Seconds after, the roar of starting outboards broke the tranquility of the morning as (must of been ten) boats headed out for fishing. Anyway.......thanks, Clarence and Miriam, for taking me fishing. Picture; Pike Lake, southern Ohio, June, 1958 (I still am a fashion icon)