In the good old days before inshore fishing was strictly regulated, our family used to go fishing in our sloop, Dorothy.
We were summer people, cottagers, not tourists. We were my wife, Mary and our three boys: twins Bob and Bill, 14, and John, 12. We sailed out of Newagen on the tip of Southport Island. All three are grandparents now. I was skipper.
The expedition started the day before when one of the twins and I went clamming on a stony beach. We carried a galvanized bucket and clam forks with short handles and wide tines.
The trick was to find some clam holes in the mud and dig as deeply as possible, near them, but not on them. We didn’t want to break the shells. Then pull up on the handle with one hand, while holding the tines deep in the mud with the other, and roll out a big clod of mud, sand, gravel and few clams. Pick over the clod, put the clams in the basket, and roll another clod into the hole. If we got enough clams, Mary would make us a clam chowder. The rest of the clams spent the night in a crocus bag in the bucket, hanging from a corner of the float.
We all arose early the next morning to catch the high tide. We swarmed aboard the sloop, not forgetting the clams. At that early time of the day there is seldom any wind, so I fired up the little two-cylinder gasoline engine and we headed off shore up the west shore of Damariscove.
As the sun rose higher, we advanced. We shucked the clams and ate a few as we slipped over the easy swell. After we passed the bell off The Motions and headed off to the east of south, I laid out the sounding lead and its marked line.
At what seemed the right time, I lowered the lead close to the water and said, “Bob, cut the engine.” As the sloop lost way, I swing the lead fore and aft until the line came slack and the end of the swing. At the next swing, I paid out the coil I held in my hand as I swing the lead as far ahead as I could. The boat coasted up to the lead. I gathered in the slack, noted the white rag tucked into the lay of the line and said, “Five fathoms.” To Bill, at the tiller, I said, “Give her half a point to the eastward.”
Meanwhile, the other two boys were setting up the little fishing anchor, bending on the rode, and rigging a trip line and buoy in case the anchor got caught down. After several soundings, the skipper called “Ten fathoms. Let’s go fishing.”
After getting ready, they took the cod lines from the deck locker. These were stout, three-stranded cotton lines, lightly tarred, each wound on a wooden reel. Each line had about a one-pound lead on the end, followed b a three-foot ganging of lighter stuff and a wicked hook. We ranged ourselves around the rails, skipper aft on the starboard side. We baited up, driving the hook through the tough head of the clam and lodging the point into the soft stomach.
“Let your line down until the lead hits bottom, and then pull it up about four feet and jig it gently,” I told the boys. There was no need to tell the boys. We had all been fishing before.
Everyone jigged. Nothing happened. The sloop heaved gently to the easy swell. We kept on jigging. Still nothing. John felt it necessary to inspect his bait. He hauled up 120 feet of line and found a bare hook.
“I’m sure I felt a twitch,” said John.
“Probably a bit of weed,” said Bob, the spoiler.
“Shows there’s something down there,” said Mary. “Bait up again, John and be sure to put the hook through the tough part of the clam.”
Plop and bubbles as the sinker went overboard. Mary began hauling in steadily, against some tension.
“Got one,” said Bob, excitedly. The skipper took a quick turn of his line around the bitt next to him and came over to help.
A white shape moved back and forth down in the dark water. A splashing alongside as Mary held up the line to keep it taut. I reached down, grabbed the ganging, and hauled aboard a lovely green-and-white cod.
Those were the good old days.
Roger F. Duncan is co-author of A Cruising Guide to the New England Coast, A Maritime History of Maine and other books.