Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $9.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too!
    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too!
    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too!
    Ebook214 pages1 hour

    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too!

    By Ron Kempter

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too! A collection of anecdotal stories about a lifetime of fishing, from the Author's childhood, throughout his career, to that of a senior citizen. The Author's fishing exploits are proven with his many photographs. His favorite expression is . . . . "I don't tell stories, I take pictures!"
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherLulu.com
    Release dateFeb 4, 2019
    ISBN9780359355853
    Fish Tales: THISLDO, too!

    Related to Fish Tales

    Related ebooks

    Biography & Memoir For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Old Ways

      Oct 4, 2022

      Old Ways
      9 min read

    • Article

      A Wild Life

      Aug 31, 2017

      A Wild Life
      10 min read

    • Article

      Out of Lockdown!

      Feb 17, 2022

      Out of Lockdown!
      5 min read

    • Article

      Better Get Tying!

      Aug 18, 2022

      Better Get Tying!
      11 min read

    • Article

      Lake Lessons

      Dec 7, 2021

      Lake Lessons
      2 min read

    • Article

      Eat Your Fish and Have It Too

      May 31, 2022

      My 16th summer was all about fish. That is, it was all about catching fish. While other boys spent their teenage summers earning money or playing baseball, I chased fish. Largemouth bass, bluegills, catfish and redeyes were in my dreams, awake or sle

      3 min read

    • Article

      Use A Sheep To Snare An Eel

      Jul 22, 2020

      Use A Sheep To Snare An Eel
      5 min read

    • Article

      Striper Moon

      Oct 20, 2020

      Striper Moon
      5 min read

    • Article

      Down East Hat Trick

      Feb 8, 2022

      Down East Hat Trick
      7 min read

    • Article

      Midlife Knocking

      Oct 20, 2020

      Midlife Knocking
      7 min read

    • Article

      Week Three In B.c.

      Sep 16, 2024

      Week Three In B.c.
      13 min read

    • Article

      Take Me Home

      Oct 4, 2022

      Take Me Home
      6 min read

    • Article

      Slaying Dragons

      Oct 1, 2024

      Slaying Dragons
      10 min read

    • Article

      American Summer

      Jul 13, 2021

      American Summer
      7 min read

    • Article

      A Surf-Smashed Home With History

      Oct 3, 2017

      It’s nice to have a place to return to year after year, through thick and thin, from childhood and the teenage years to your single-minded, hard-fishing adult decades and into whatever lies beyond. For me, that place is a mussel bar in southern New E

      3 min read

    • Article

      Hold What Where?

      May 28, 2024

      Hold What Where?
      3 min read

    • Article

      Snipe Ahoy In A Flat Float

      Mar 31, 2021

      Snipe Ahoy In A Flat Float
      6 min read

    • Article

      You’re Not Going To Need A Bigger Boat

      Sep 22, 2021

      There was a time when, if you wanted to go shark fishing, you went to Looe in Cornwall. Looe was the epicentre of shark fishing in the UK, mostly for the smaller, more placid blue shark. Indeed, I went to film an episode of Screaming Reels with shark

      6 min read

    • Article

      Fish Hippies

      Jul 13, 2021

      Fish Hippies
      12 min read

    • Article

      River Kismet

      Jul 21, 2020

      River Kismet
      9 min read

    • Article

      If You’re Born to Hang…

      Jul 9, 2019

      “Local kids don’t drown.” That’s what charter skipper Ben Rathbun told me years ago. In a roundabout way, we were talking about what author Wallace Stegner referred to as the “mongrel smartness” of Huckleberry Finn—the native intelligence of both loc

      3 min read

    • Article

      End-times steelhead

      Dec 17, 2020

      End-times steelhead
      11 min read

    • Article

      Fish Story

      May 21, 2019

      Fish Story
      13 min read

    • Article

      A Reel Challenge

      May 13, 2021

      Fishing has become a part of my life’s fabric. It wasn’t always—in fact, it’s only been since last spring, when COVID-19 made our family full-time residents of Blue Mountain Lake. (Blue is a place deeply entrenched in our hearts, but had always been

      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Fish Tales

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Fish Tales - Ron Kempter

      www.lulu.com

      Dedication

      To the many friends and family, that allowed me to have so much fun!

      . . . and Dad!

      Thank you!

      You can never go home again,but the truth is, you can never leave home either!

      Maya Angelou, Poet Laureate

      If it wasn’t this way, it would be some other way!

      Bill Draffen, Systems Analyst

      Life is too short to fish with an ugly rod!

      Pat Vinzant, Custom Rod Maker       

              You only live once; but if you do it right, once is enough!

      Captain Bill Willis, Fishing Guide

      Preface

      This DIY effort is my attempt to record the many memorable times and places, and certainly the people, that have given me a lifetime of wonderful fishing experiences, from childhood to old age.

      It goes without saying, that all were not all that wonderful, and many more were not worth remembering!

      The stories are ones that I love to remember, and that I have told many times, because I love to tell them!

      These anecdotal stories may not be chronologically aligned correctly, and may have been embellished with age, but are historically accurate and true. The people and places mentioned herein, are to the best of my recollection, correct, and corroborated by information available on the Internet.  Attribution is noted, as appropriate.

      Many of the included photographs are captured snapshots from original VHS tapes, which may include images recorded on original 35mm slides. It should be noted that this book includes plagiarized excerpts from my autobiography, THISLDO!

      So before I begin, I must again thank God for the many blessings he has given me, whether I was fishing or not, and has allowed me to say . . . .

      THISLDO, too!

      Mud Creek

      My recollection of catching my first fish would be in the spring of 1944,from ‘Mud Creek’, a canal between Big Muskego Lake and Wind Lake, southwest of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It was there that George, my new stepfather and an avid fisherman, would take me fishing for the first time.

      I was almost 7 years old.

      Then, Highway 36 bridge over the wide canal provided access to both sides of the water, which was full of spawning fish of many kinds, mostly of the sunfish family like bass, bluegill and crappie, as well as bullheads and northern pike. My first fish was a yellow bass, 10 inches long, caught with a cane pole, cork, sinker and hook! In those days, the line was braided rayon! Nylon was reserved for the war effort!

      Dad had a large cantilevered fishing tackle box, crammed with lures and terminal tackle of all sorts: spoons and top water plugs for black bass; steel leaders for northern pike; several sizes of red and white floats, with which to cast out large minnows for northern pike! He had 2 steel rods equipped with Pflueger ‘Nobby’ level wind casting reels! These were among the finest in fishing gadgets of the day! In time, he would teach me the use of this equipment, until such time that I could acquire my own fishing tackle. 

      Of course, he had acquired several 12-14 foot cane poles, that were always tied to the roof of the car! These were usually baited with night crawler worms, or small minnows, with which to catch the panfish. The cane poles were kept under the edge of the roof back home.

      I remember Mom yelling . . .  Help! Help! Bring the net! when she caught a northern pike 30 inches long! It was bigger than anything we had ever caught before!

      I also remember Dad taking me to a small lake in Hale’s Corners, fishing with long cane poles, baited with nightcrawlers for big bluegills, fishing from the shore. The story was that a fisherman had been in a boat, when apparently it overturned, and he drowned! It was said that the lake was dragged to recover the body, but neither he nor the bottom were ever found, as they could not reach either one! 

      As I got older, Dad would teach me the proper way to cast, with a casting rod and reel. He would place an old tire in our yard as a target, and have me cast to get a small piece of wood into the tire. He taught me to keep my wrist turned so the reel handle knobs were pointed up, then snapping the wrist forward with the lower arm, while casting overhead, thumbing the line as it came off the revolving spool reel. When casting sidearm, to use only the lower arm while keeping the wrist stiff, always finish by pointing the rod at the target.

      After I got good at it, he would have me back up several yards at a time, until I could no longer reach it, or I got really good at it! Also, I got good at picking loops out of the old braided line, whenever the reel would backlash!

      The Milwaukee Sentinel held an annual ‘Sports Show and Exhibition’ at the old downtown Auditorium. Its large center stage included a swimming pool for many different water sports. The show included a casting competition using both casting and spinning rods. 3 man teams were made up of major brand sponsors in the fishing world. Casting at floating rings, they were scored on how many casts were on target, within a given time slot! This really impressed me!

      I also recall a fly rod demonstration, that included a man preventing a young girl from reaching the other end of the pool while swimming, as if he were fighting a big fish!

      Clear Lake

      I remember when once a year or more back in the late 1940’s, my parents would plan our drive around the lake to visit my dad’s sister Amy in Three Rivers, Michigan, and would vacation there on Clear lake.

      It meant the chance to go fishing for bluegills and yellow perch, with an occasional bullhead, or maybe even a black bass! We would fish from old wooden rowboats, with long cane poles baited with nightcrawler pieces and dragon fly larva known as wigglers.

      The lake was big to a young boy, with crystal clear water that was deep in the middle, but shallow near the shore. Whenever I went fishing by myself, Mom would say . . .  Stay by the shore! Of course, the best place to go fishing was by the deep weed beds across the lake, or the nearby lily pads. That’s where the biggest bluegills were!

      I can still hear her calling out from the top of the concrete steps from the cottage to the dock . . .

      Ronnie! Supper! as a platter full of fried bluegills and a bowl of potato salad was waiting to be eaten!

      And swimming! We all loved to go swimming there, especially at the end of the dock, where the

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1