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Barefoot In The Sand: Remembering the Waning Days of the Hopewell Community (1998) Bruce C. Gragg 59/123

WE LIKED OUR FISHING TOO

In that same part of the river we did a lot of fishing at different
times of the year. Papa had gotten some little red wiggler worms from
someone and we kept a supply of them to use whenever we went fishing.
These worms weren't big enough to bait the big hooks, but bream hooks
they worked great. This was his hobby, taking care of the worm tub.
It was an old wash tub, with some holes in the bottom for drainage.
About once a year we had to take an afternoon and change the worm
bed. We would get fresh dirt, some stable fertilizer, mix it
thoroughly,- put the mixture in a different tub, get a good quantity
of worms from the old bed and start the new one. On one occasion,
there was a clump of healthy worms, I told Papa to stop, he was
hitting the side of the tub with a shovel. He didn’t hear me, I still
have a scar about 3/4 inch over my left eye, the shovel point left a
gash when it made contact. He thought he had killed me when he saw
what had happened. I did see stars! Matter of fact I saw too many to
count. We did get the job completed, after a bit of first-aid and a
little patching up. After that I was careful not to get too close to
a swinging shovel.

When we were going after the really big ones, we would go collect
some earthworms. We would drive a wooden stake into the ground and
take an old spring leaf and "Grunt" them up. It was just a matter of
walking around and picking them up. The vibration created by rasping
the spring across the wooden stake was more than their sound sensing
devices could take, they came out of the ground as a means of escape.
Some escape! It worked though. At times we would get crickets,
grasshoppers, or whatever was available at the time to use as bait.
Salt pork or pork skin would also do quite well. If you were fishing
for catfish or mudfish just about any type of meat would accomplish
the mission and catch the one that maybe didn't get away.

While going and coming we never knew what kind of wild life we might
see. Near the river we could just about always count on seeing at
least a couple "Cotton Mouth or Copper Heads." On one fishing trip
while Curtis and Carroll were home, I was 9 or 10 years old, kid like
I became quite tired of fishing and began to play. Curtis was a bit
annoyed and took me to join the rest of the family. Carroll, came
about 30 to 45 minutes later, with a broken fishing pole and dragging
a big stringer of fish. On his string was the largest Mud Fish (a Mud
Fish is somewhat a fresh water species of the salt water black fish.
When cleaned they are not scaled like most fish, rather the scales
are cut off in long strips. They are a bottom dweller thus the name)
any of us had ever seen. After returning home and time to clean the
fish Carroll

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