In the fall of '48 we moved from Kentucky to Florida. I was 15. We didn't have a lot of money -- in those days nobody did -- but my father and I managed to buy a fishing rod with a big Penn reel on it. We also bought a single lure, a red and white, wooden plug made by Heddon. I would come home from school and grab that rod and head for the water. Sometimes I went to the causeway that connects Fort Pierce to south beach. Other times I fished from a seawall or a pier. Another favorite spot was the jetty at the north end of the south beach.

Fishing was good. There were mangrove snappers, pompano, snook, sea trout, sheep head, sailor's choice, and lots of others.

What made fishing even more interesting was that in those days you could sell your catch at one of the "fish houses" at either end of the causeway bridge. Depending on variety, fish brought a dime or a quarter per pound and some fetched as much as 90 cents a pound. Pompano was at the high end of the scale.

I usually fished every afternoon until supper time and then my father would come home from work and it was his turn. He usually did a little better than me, mainly because the fish bit better at dusk. But he sometimes tired quickly after working hard all day, and I would get a chance for some late evening fishing.

We shared that fishing rod and lure for several weeks before the lure was lost. I don't remember which one of us lost it, but it was battered and chipped and would not have lasted much longer anyway. I think we had been there for a year before we ever owned more than one lure at a time, and two years before we got a second fishing rod. Sometimes we used a hook with shrimp for bait, but we both preferred artifical lures.

I think the best fishing we ever did was when my father borrowed a boat. It was an open wooden boat with a six horsepower Briggs inboard. It was about 18 feet long and belonged to a commercial fisherman who never used it on weekends.

So every weekend we would get in that boat and use the engine to get us out into the middle of the river.

To avoid confusion, I need to mention that the Indian River is not a river at all, but a salt water lagoon behind a long skinny barrier island. As the tide rises the current flows into the lagoon and then goes south parallel to the mainland for several miles. Then the current stops and as the tide falls, the water goes back the other way.

So when we reached the center of the river, we would stop the engine and just float with the tide and fish as we drifted along. If you waited long enough, the current would return you to your starting point.

If we had a good day, we would sell several dollars worth of fish. Most of the money went for bait and tackle.

Those were good days. I guess that is why I tried to take my own kids fishing when I had a chance. And now it's my grand children.
Howard