Life With A Fisherman

I’ll never forget how warm inside I felt that day and how wet I was from that storm as we left Edgartown harbor and headed to the bluff. The captain and I were both shivering from the cold by the time we reached my house. Mom took one look at us and put us both in dry clothes. She told the captain that he was staying here for the night. He didn’t argue. We dried off and sat down to a wonderful turkey dinner. The captain had no problem falling fast asleep that night. I went on to tell Mom of my first tuna trip and showed her the picture we had taken at the dock of the great tuna. As she was salting the fish that we brought home, she said: “OK, my young fisherman, you get the dishes done before bed, and I’ll get to smoking the fish.” Out the door she went to start the smoker. I had the dishes cleaned in no time and off to bed I went. I fell asleep thinking of how proud my dad was going to be of me when he returned from his tuna fishing. I could not wait to tell him of my trip.

It was about 4 in the morning, and I woke to the smell of smoke. I remember thinking that Mom was still up tending to the tuna on the smoker and started to go back to sleep. The I herd the bells at the church. They were the warning bells. The captain woke and starting yelling, “Get up, Cappy, and hitch the horses to the wagon. There’s a fire somewhere!” Dad was still out to sea with the crew fishing. The sun was just rising and the sky blue. We could see smoke filling the sky to our south. “It’s the Whitehead’s house,” Captain Ben yelled. My mom didn’t say a word. She just stared at the horizon full of smoke. We reached the house and quickly joined our neighbors in the fire fight with buckets of water. By the time the fire wagon reached the house, it was too late. The house was pretty much burned to the ground. The fire wagon was a pump that was hand-operated and pulled by horses. It took four men to work it. The men running it knew that the house was a loss and pumped water on the barn, which was next the burning house. We saved the barn after a two-hour fire fight. All was lost except the barn and animals.

I looked for my mom and saw her hugging Mrs. Whitehead. Maggie was sitting on the ground next to them. Captain Ben and I went over to them. Captain Ben picked up Maggie from the ground to hold her. Mrs. Whitehead was crying, “What are we going to do? We just lost everything.” Mom told her, “You still have your lives, and you can thank God for that. You will stay with us until the house is rebuilt.” It took all I could because I was very shy, but I reached out my hand to Maggie, and she held it very tight. I’ll never forget the sparkles in her ocean-blue eyes as we looked at each other. And that was the start of a life-lasting friendship between Maggie and me. We loaded ourselves on our wagon and headed home. As we reached our house, Mom told them that we have plenty of room in our house for them, and they could stay as long as they needed. For the rest of the day, Captain Ben, Maggie and I rounded up their animals to bring them to their new home at our barn. It took a while to gather their chickens and turkeys, but the two cows came easily.

After a few days, our fathers returned from sea. I remember Mr. Whitehead and Dad talking at the kitchen table. They had had a very bad time tuna fishing, and their take from the sea was very small. Maggie and I were sitting on the steps that led to our second floor. We were supposed to be sleeping. But we couldn’t sleep that night with all that was going on. Maggie’s father was saying that he didn’t know how he was going to buy the wood from the lumberyard to rebuild his house. That it was going to cost around $200 for the lumber — and maybe more than that. Dad told him that, God willing, we will get it done somehow. He said that this is a time for the townspeople, and that they will be there to help like they always do. Mr. Whitehead replied that he knew all would help to rebuild, but it’s still going to cost money that he doesn’t have. He had lost all his savings in the fire.

I looked at Maggie, and tears were running from her eyes down her cheek. I took Maggie by the hand and said, “Come with me,” and we went to my room. I pulled my old wooden box from under my bed and dumped it on the floor. “Where did you get that, Cappy?” “I’ve been saving all my money that I’ve been making from trapping lobsters and my split of the big tuna.” We counted all my savings, and it added up to $78. And back then, that was a lot of savings. “Come on, Maggie, I want to give this to your dad for the lumber.” We went downstairs to the kitchen, and I set the money on the table in front of Maggie’s dad. “What’s this?” he asked. Before Dad could say anything, I told him that it was my share of fishing that I’ve been doing with Captain Ben. And I looked at Mr. Whitehead and said, “Its yours to put toward lumber for your house.” My dad smiled at me. I could see that he was very proud of what I was trying to do. Mr. Whitehead quickly replied that he could not take my money. And he was very happy that I offered it. But there was no way he could take it. My dad spoke up and said that it’s not charity, it’s a loan. “Cappy will loan this to you. With this money, you can put a down payment on the lumber at the mill, and we will set up a payment plan for the rest.” Mr. Whitehead shook my hand and said it was a deal and that he’d pay me back with interest.

For the next three weeks, the towns people really came together. They all chipped in to rebuild the house. One day while the construction was going on, I asked Maggie if she wanted to go fishing. Captain Ben wasn’t feeling well and didn’t want to go, but he told us of a spot up island to do some shore fishing and to fish the bottom, using squid for bait. We jumped on a horse and headed for the dock at the Edgartown harbor. There, we jigged up a bunch of squid to use and headed up island to what was called the clay ledges in Gay Head. That’s where most of the island Indians lived. They are the Wampanoag Indians. This was their land way before the white man stepped foot on it . We went down the old horse trail to the shoreline to a spot where the water was deep and rocky. At this spot, I said to Maggie, “Let’s fish.” We watched the seagulls coming at us from the beach. There where hundreds of them were, and they were diving into the water. They got closer and closer, then went right past us. We had no idea what that was all about until later when I told Captain Ben about it. I remember him laughing and telling me that the gulls where eating leftover bait that the school of blues where feeding on. He called it a feeding frenzy. He then told me how to fish them as they pass by. “You get a lure on real fast and cast right into them,” he said. “In no time, you’ll have a bucket of blues.” Anyhow, Maggie and I had caught three real nice stripers. One of them was around 30 pounds, a real big fish. I caught it and was bragging that I’d got the biggest one, when out of nowhere, Maggie’s pole almost pulled her into the water. She played that fish better than I’ve ever seen anyone play a fish. It took her about 30 minutes to land it, and it was one of the biggest I have ever seen to this day. As it came onto shore, I jumped on it so it wouldn’t get away. That bass weighed in at 64 pounds. I have never heard the end of that catch . Still today, she brags of it.

Well, we loaded up the horse with our fish and headed home. As we reached Maggie’s new house, there was a party going on. The house was basically done, and everybody decided to have one big party. Captain Ben broke out a barrel of his rum, and all the menfolk where having a blast. They were telling some tales of fishing. I heard it all that day. Most of what I heard, I didn’t believe. Those were real fish tales, if ya know what I mean. Then I saw Maggie’s dad look at me as he went into his now house. He came out with something in his hand and came right over to us. He interrupted a fish tale and got everybody’s attention. “Young Captain Cappy,” he said with a smile. I stood up when he called me Captain Cappy, and looked him right in the eyes. I couldn’t believe he called me Captain. That got everybody’s attention. “I wish to pay you back the money you loaned me, if I may.” And he handed me a piece of paper with writing on it. “If you will accept this, we will be even. It gives me great honor to give this to you.” I read the paper. It was a deed giving me 50 acres of land on the bluff harbor. I stood very proud, saying that I accept and that this makes us even. I couldn’t believe what had just happened. I was now a property owner of very prime property on the bluff. From that day forward, I was known to all as Captain Cappy.

The next day, Maggie and I walked my new land. She showed me every corner of the property. She knew it like the back of her hand. There was one spot that caught my eye. It was a thicket of bamboo. “Traps,” I said. “Maggie, this is the wood that we make crawl traps with.” Maggie asked, “Crawl traps? What is a crawl trap?” I laughed and said, “Lobsters, silly.” I then told her about my crawl trapping with Captain Ben. She thought that was pretty funny. But as I thought about it, I wanted to do more fishing for lobsters. I sat down on the ground looking at the bamboo. “Maggie, I want to build more traps. I want to start more trap lines. I want to be a lobsterman. Look there at the bamboo. I have plenty for making my new traps, right from my own land. I have a boat. Salty is mine, Captain Ben gave her to me. All I need is a raft to pull behind her. Will you help me?” She replied, “Oh my, yes.” I said, “I need to tell Captain Ben what is on my mind.” So off we went to his house. He was feeling much better now and loved my idea. He told me that I already was a lobsterman and that I had a raft to use. I didn’t need to make one, that what was his was mine. A tear came to my eye as I hugged him. He was like a grandfather to me. “Well,” I said, “we need to start making more traps.” I told him that I wanted to trap every day and needed about 500 more traps . He looked into my eyes and told me that I had a great idea. “People are starting to like lobsters in the city, and we will be able to sell every one we trap. I’ll talk to your father tonight about selling the crawls we trap. If we can set it up so that your father is delivering them to the hole, he can make bounty with us. I’ll help you with everything that needs to be done, young Captain,” he said with a smile.

The captain and my father came to agreement that night. We decided to build a dock in the lagoon on my land that a big boat could use to dock for picking up the crawls. It was also decided that Maggie and I would run Salty out and take care of the trapping, and we would use the money made to build the dock so there were no loans. The Captain would be in charge of the dock and the big cage that needed to be built to hold the lobsters at the dock until they went to market. The next day, Maggie and I started making traps. We worked day and night on them. As we would get 30 traps built, we would take them out with Salty. About a year passed by, and Maggie and I were bringing in over 500 pounds of lobsters per day. It was a great sight coming into the bluff harbor and seeing Captain Ben standing on the dock in front of the little building that was built on it just for him, with all the traps stacked on top of one another in the background. It was quite a sight to see.

A few years passed and one night while we were moving the crawls from the barrels to the live pens on the dock, I told Captain Ben that I thought it was time to get a bigger boat. “One with no name,” he said, “so that you can name her. It’s bad luck to rename a boat. Once a boat has a name, it’s hers for the float’s life. What are you thinking for a new boat, Captain Cappy?” I said, “I’m thinking something with a motor. They are putting motors on boats now that run with diesel for fuel. I think I want to look into one.” As he stared at Salty, he said, “EYEEEE! It’s time for a new boat.”