A Day At The
Pumphouse
In the northern coal fields of West Virginia, summer's early morning dawn came with the whistle of the 5 A.M. coal train placing empties at Bethlehem Steel No. 7 coal mine and the rousing of our family. That was my dad's alarm clock and the time my dad started fixing the morning brew, a two quart pot of rich black coffee.
In those days, the coffee and the water were dumped directly into the pot, and allowed to boil. The coffee boiling over was like a modern day snooze button on the alarm clock. As soon as that occurred, my dad would jump out of bed a second time and turn down the flame to keep it at a slow rolling boil. During this time my father dressed and prepared for a light breakfast of home made toasted bread, a few fresh eggs fried sunny-side up and three or four slices of home cured bacon. My mother was not a short order cook, but when it came time to prepare my father's breakfast, she prepared it with the perfection of a master chef and when she presented the plate to my father, she always added a side dish, a few ounces of TLC, a kiss on his forehead. It always seemed to me his breakfast, that kiss and his steeping cup of coffee was his "Almost Heaven".
Drinking coffee at our house was a daily ritual; breakfast, supper and evening. It was the mornings I enjoyed the most. When I heard my father stirring his coffee, I would get out of bed and go directly to him. He would pick me up, sit me on his lap and hand feed me toast with small sips of his coffee. It was during this time, my mother fixed his dinner bucket for work, and we got to talk about fishing, ground hog hunting, climbing trees, hiking, playing baseball, and school. These mornings were very enjoyable. Time moved by very quickly and it was time for my father to go to work. However, he never forgot my three older sleeping brothers, he would take each a cup of coffee for them to drink in bed. While he waited beside their bed, he would talk to each of them and discuss yesterdays problems or happy moments.
When my father began to gather the empty coffee cups, that was the signal for me to put on my jack-pants, get my fishing pole, and signal my dog, Boy, it was time to go fishing. The largest and most prolific bass population was located at the so call "Pump House" swimming hole. It was close to five feet deep, had a smooth, cool bottom with a rocky bank outcropping. This fishing hole was the safest for me to fish and also the best place to swim in the entire Buffalo Creek water shed.
With my dad giving my mother a final kiss, I would give her a big huge and tell her where I was going to fish. She always would hold me by my shoulders and say, "Do you really have to go to that creek"? Oh yes, and her famous last words, "Don't you get wet". That was like telling a duck not to swim. I would smile, give her a kiss and say, "OK mother". To tell my mother that I was going to wade in the creek and catch crawdads for bait would have ended all fishing. My father understood fishing and normally remained quiet during these discussions. To help me through this bombardment of do's and don'ts, my father would put me in front of him and nudge me out the door and help me down the steps by holding my hand. That seemed to comfort my mother, who remained in the doorway with a smile on her face.
There were days when my father would ride with a friend and other's when he chose to walk to the local coal mine. Today he chose to walk with me down Tony Sergi's hill to the iron bridge which crossed the fishing stream. It was always fun to walk with my dad. First, I was happy to be seen with my dad; second, he never talked down to me; third, I liked to hold his hand and feel the security he gave me; and last, we talked about fishing.
As dad and I parted our ways at the end of the iron bridge, he would yell "Bring home the bacon". He bragged continuously to his buddies at the mine about my hunting and fishing abilities. He walked up the No. 7 Hill to the mine and I walked the railroad tracks to the pump house. Although I was on a relatively level area, my dad was walking up a hill running parallel. From time to time as we walked, he would yell, "Have a good time", and I would yell, "I love you", waving our hands to each other.
Dad always came home to us and I loved him for the hard, dangerous work he performed in the mine. We sat on our front porch swing many hours talking about his job and how it was accomplished. He was president of his local union, chairman of the safety committee and a member of the mine committee. He was a very concerned person and all who knew him gave him a vote of confidence when it came time to reelect union officials each year.
He was in charge of delivering surplus food to retired miners and widows of local miners. I used to ride with him when he delivered and got to meet his well wishing friends. He always introduced me as "This is my baby Joe", then would exclaim, "He's my young man". These touching moments of happiness and love displayed by people who knew my father has always stayed with me in a very special way.
Twenty years later, I became a Federal Coal Mine Inspector and worked for the health and safety of miners. It wasn't until then I truly understood the feelings my father felt, when he helped the miners with their problems.
Walking the rail road track was an art form practiced by little boys who preferred not to wear shoes and liked to fish and swim at the pump house. In these early morning walks the wooden rail ties were smooth and cool to my feet and made walking easy. Wearing shoes was done only on special occasions, like going to church and visiting a relative. Walking the ties was short lived. Rail road workers, in their zeal to stabilize the subbase, had compacted large amounts of ballast. This material, old processed iron ore, gradually had worked it's way onto the ties making it painful to little bare feet.
I was never in the circus nor did I ever do a high wire act, however when the ties became covered with the ballast, it was time to walk on the shinny steel rails. With fishing pole in one hand and a can of worms in the other, I could walk several hundred feet before losing my balance. To regain my balance, jumping from one rail to the other was a remedy until balance was regained. It was important to be come an efficient rail walker, a big incentive, to avoid a fall with cuts and bruises. Over the years I gained a sound reputation for being one of the best at walking the rail. Once I walked the entire distance, one and a quarter miles, from the Iron bridge to the No. 7 baseball field without a fall.
The pump house was a facility owned and operated by the coal mine. It was located below the mine along the Buffalo Creek in a deep creek channel. Here they got their supply of water to operate the coal cleaning plant. Without this supply of water, they could not use the coal to produce steel. Washing cleans the coal of mining debris called ash and reduces it's sulfur content. This produces a high quality coal product necessary in producing a high grade steel. My father made me aware of this importance and cautioned me to be careful and not disturb any of the mining equipment. The miners jobs were directly dependent on it's continued success.
The pump house in sight brings great anticipation. It is not uncommon for some of my friends to take an early morning swim and disturb the early feeding time for bass and raccoons may have hit the soft crab population during the night.
Fishing really isn't all that complicated, as taught to me by my brother's good friend, Billy Koch. There were a few main points, among others, that he taught me. I must have the proper bait and make a good presentation to the fish.
Billy was six years older than me and under today's standards, he was a fisherman a head of his time. He could flick a fishing line to within an inch of his target and seldom missed a fish's strike. His teaching ability and method of a making a presentation rivaled, the so called, modern day fishing experts. Billy believed and practiced ‘catch and release' by letting the female bass return to the stream and to harvest only those caught with life threatening wounds. As he explained, if I pursued this route, there would be bass in the stream to be catch over and over again. The enjoyment of catching your own bait in the stream, making a good presentation and properly handling the catch, would go a long ways in making you feel good about yourself and make a contribution back to nature.
Crawdads are the main natural food source for the small mouth bass. Learning to catch them is a long drawn out trial and error process. There is one way to learn and that is to learn through repetition. You will miss the first 100 times before catching one of these small elusive creatures.
Crawdads feed and molt their exoskeletons at night. This produces a crawdad which is as soft as jelly. The longer they remain in the water, their shells get harder. In acquiring the best bait, you want the softest or the ones that are just ready to molt, called ‘peelies.' The ‘peelies' are the next best thing to one which has freshly molted, because you can assist the process and peel them just before you use them. They remain alive and provide the body movements perfectly for enticing the bass. This bait type is normally not found crawling around and is hidden beneath flat rocks near the warm water edge. It is no wonder when a bass spots one of these delicious morsels crawling around in the day time, they are irresistible to their palate.
You can fish all day with a hard shell crab or a night crawler and not get a strike. You would swear there was not a fish to be found in the stream. Put a fresh molted or soft shell crab on your line; cast in the current above the fishing hole, and it will only take minutes before you will be playing a bass on your line. Many years later, I shared these secrets with my young son and more recently, to my daughter, Kim. They both perfected the art of catching the crawdads with there hands and shared the enjoyment of fighting a small mouth bass. Trying to end their fishing day was like trying to pull a rusty spike nail from a well seasoned oak plank. You needed a crowbar to break them away.
Life has gone full cycle. My daughter Kim teaches me to fish in the Atlantic Ocean surf and how to throw an islander net. It is a delight to see her intense interest and pure joy when she catches a fish. My son Joe is now teaching his children to catch the elusive sun fish and the sport of having a good time.
With a plentiful supply of crawdads caught and placed in my jack- pants pocket, it was time to put to work the many lessons that Billy had taught me. Let's see, think like a fish, swim like a fish and eat like a fish.
Casting my bait into the riffles and taking in a little of the slack line, it is now time to be on the alert. In my mind, I can see the bait swimming along the bottom and the school of bass waiting in the feeding area. With a slight nudge on my line, the line stops drifting and appears to be moving up stream. It's time to give the bass some line, if he feels the line pulling against him, he will leave the bait. I try to count how many feet of line has been given the fish. Then just as fast as he had strike the bait, it stops pulling on the bait. During this pause, the fish is swallowing the crawdad, now it is time to take in any excess line, hold the pole high and prepare to set the hook. As I await this moment, my heart is pounding in my chest. Will he go again or has he stripped my bait from my hook? Then without warning, there he goes again. I allow all of the excess line to be taken and then JERK! Immediately I can feel the weight of the fish, my pole bends double and faster than I can say anything, the fish leaped into the air, waving it's head and tail high above the water. Talk about excitement, this is the ultimate fishing experience. Playing the fish and enjoying the fight.
Having caught several bass, one after the other, it was time to lay back and enjoy the warm sunshine. A high, clean sandbar existed just behind us, and it was the perfect place to set my pole and get some sleep.
My dog, Boy who would not leave my side until I gave him permission, sat beside me and watched my pole while I slept. Boy had learned a lot about fishing over the years. It was now his turn to sit, watch and warn me when I got a strike. As soon as my pole began bouncing or my line started to feed out, he would bark. He loved to participate by running up and down at the water's edge while I played the fish. Sometimes when the fish jumped, he would get overly excited and swim into the fishing hole. I tried not to let this be a problem and further encouraged him. Fishing was fun and never was a do or die thing with me. After all my dog, Boy was my best friend and I wanted fishing to be fun for him too.
Boy had always been a good swimmer. Even as a pup, he could swim the entire length of the pump house swimming hole. However, his greatest victories came while hunting ground hogs.
After I had caught some fish, it was Boy's turn to check the hill across from the fishing hole for ground hogs. I would ask him, "Have you heard any ‘whistle pigs' this morning?" At that moment, he would start to bark and run in circles, kicking sand and small pebbles into the air. His response to my question was without a doubt, a big yes. Without hesitation I would release his stay command and say, "OK, go get one".
Plunging into the stream, Boy swam across the pump house swimming hole like he was jet propelled and made his way up the hill and into the woods. Soon he would start to give long bellowing barks. I would yell to him, "Is he deep or shallow?" If the hog was deep, he would come to me. It was like telling me the hog was too deep, and it was not worth the effort to dig it out. On the other hand if he remained at the hole, it was shallow and he expected me to come and help him. Any way you look at it, Boy got to have some fun too. On his way back he always seem to swim right through the middle of the pump house fishing hole and that certainly ended the fishing for the day.
Skipping rocks was considered a pass time for many kids that didn't fish. To keep up with the neighborhood gang, I always skipped a dozen to keep my arm in tune. I had a real good arm and was known as one of the better skippers in our community. Some days we would all get together just below the iron bridge, on a long sand bar, and have a contest. I got 15 skips to win a contest one day. All that week when we went to baseball practice, the guys talked about the 15 skipper.
The key to skipping rocks was to find a near perfectly flat rock; about half as heavy as a baseball and throw it side arm. I had established the technique of dipping my shoulder and leaning way over to my right when I threw it. Sometimes my hand would almost touch the ground when I threw it. As you can see, practice and good technique gave bragging rights to the best skipper. There was one cardinal rule we all had to follow and that was, NEVER THROW ROCKS ON THE DAY OF A BASEBALL GAME. There was no place for a sore arm pitcher on game day.
With the sun high in the sky, it was time for my dog Boy and me to go home for lunch. It was always an ordeal to get home. I could try to walk the scalding hot rails or cross the creek and walk the old street car track. I would choose the street car track because it led to a short-cut pathway etched between the hills. This trail led to my farm neighbor's meadow, barn and wagon road home.
One of the things I always did, was keep at least one of the largest bass. I had a habit of carrying my pole over my shoulder and have the bass still attached to my hook. As I strutted in my bare feet, it made the fish sway back and forth which made a nice display for neighbors to see.
My mother cleaned my fish and put it in the freezer. On Fridays, she would thaw and cook them for our supper. My dad used to pat me on the shoulder at the supper table and say, "Joey is a real man. He knows how to bring the bacon home." Turning his head away from the table and out of view of my brothers, Daddy gave me a wink with his eye, a big smile and gave us all a little laugh. I really liked my dad's laugh. It made me feel good all evening long.
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