Muddy River Blues

Muddy River Blues

   The hot, sticky humidity hit us like a blast furnace when my son John and I stepped out of his air conditioned car on August 5th at River Front Park near downtown Kansas City. It was seven o’clock in the evening and the cicada’s had already reached a fevered pitch with their shrill songs as we walked down the boat ramp.

  Catfisherman, Branden Stombaugh, his eight year old boy, Eric and their 20 foot long Lowe Line Jon boat were waiting for us at the Missouri rivers edge.

 We were about to embark on a four hour fishing trip to try and catch a trophy catfish on the muddy waters of the Mighty Mo.  Never having been on the Missouri, I was a little nervous as everyone found a place to sit in the seven foot wide boat. A good shove from John propelled us out into the swift current where the smooth running 75 horse Evinrude  took over and began pushing us up the river.

  Within a few hundred feet a massive sand dredge came in to view. It was anchored to the bottom of the river and there was no sign of life on board. With the crew off for the weekend, it looked eerily like an ancient ghost ship as we slowly made our way past it.

   “Getting bait will be the first order of business” yelled Branden over the engine noise. “We should be able to find a small feeder creek on the Kansas River where we can throw casting nets for shad”. As we approached the area, Branden eased back on the throttle to slow the boat down. Young Eric suddenly stood up and scampered over to the console and crouched underneath it. The boy knew from previous trips with his dad that Asian carp dislike the noise the motor makes and would begin jumping over and in the boat at slower speeds.

  Right on cue, dozens and dozens of carp weighing in excess of ten pounds began leaping high into the air emulating King Salmon in a mountain stream. One made the costly mistake of landing on the floor of the boat where he would become catfish bait along with the shad we netted.

   “Lets head back down stream to the Missouri river and fish by one of the wing dikes and see what we can catch” Branden said as we sped away from the motor hating carp.

  As soon as we were securely anchored, Branden began getting the heavy duty rod and reels ready. I asked him why he fishes this particular river when there are so many lakes and ponds around the metropolitan area.

    “I grew up in Illinois and loved fishing for catfish on the small rivers in that part of the state” he said. “When I first moved to Kansas City three years ago I drove across one of the Missouri river bridges and said wow! I have to learn how to fish it! I’d never seen a river that big and figured it had to have huge catfish”.

   “The river is quiet and peaceful with very few boats and fisherman to contend with” he said as he cast one of the rods baited with a big chunk of shad towards a scour hole at the end of the wing dike.

  When the last of the poles were baited and set in rod holders on a rack about three feet high across the back of the boat I sat down and noticed all the cars driving across the Lewis and Clark Viaduct. “What do you suppose all those motorists think when they look down here and see three men sitting in a boat on a huge river like this” I wondered out loud.

Thirty five year old Branden chuckled and said they probably think were nuts. He remembers his friends telling him he was border line crazy for going out on the Missouri and completely insane once they found out he spends the entire night there and actually sleeps in the boat while anchored.

Other than the current, the river seemed as calm and serene as any lake I had ever been on so I asked Branden what the biggest danger is. 

.  The look on his face showed that he was dead serious when he said the main danger on the river is your self. “You have to pay attention to what you are doing and use plain old common sense”. I actually feel safer on the river in the middle of the night with dense fog than I do on Smithville Lake in the middle of the day. Be careful around wing dikes, barges and bridge pillars and you’ll be fine.

  A cool, refreshing breeze found its way down the river just as the sun began sinking over the horizon, leaving behind, a stunning, reddish orange sky.

   Suddenly, the clicker on one of the reels started screaming as line began disappearing into the river at an alarming rate. The pole that just five minutes earlier had been pointing to a beautiful Kansas City skyline was now pointing down at the water.

  I was quite surprised that a man 6’1” and 270 pounds could move so quickly when Branden grabbed the rod and reel and began cranking.  The seven foot rod was bent double and looked like it would snap in two any minute as the skilled fisherman fought the angry fish and current. With darkness now beginning to engulf the boat, it would be hard for John to net the trophy catfish. The line danced around in the murky water as Branden brought the monster close to the surface next to the boat. John thrust the net below the water where he thought the fish should be but missed on the first two attempts.   The old saying, third times the charm came true as he successfully netted the 45 pound Flathead catfish and deposited it in to the bottom of the Jon boat.

  We wasted no time getting the hook out so a few photos could quickly be taken and the fish released back into the river where it would continue to grow and reproduce. Things were obviously heating up as Branden caught a 20 pound Bluecat just ten minutes later. Unfortunately, I had to be up very early the next morning and had to leave after just two hours of actual fishing.

“You didn’t give it a fair chance” Branden said. “Meet me here next Saturday night so we can try it again”

  Saturday evening quickly arrived and I once again found myself in Branden’s spacious boat. This time my daughter in law, Shani Castle came with me. The 27 year old shot her first deer on the farm she grew up on at eight years of age and now she wanted a crack at a monster cat.

  Back in the same spot as the week before, the three of us eased into the comfortable folding chairs to wait for a bite, I watched Eric make a long cast towards the north bank. “He handles that rod and reel very well for an eight year old kid” I said. “He should” said Branden. “That boy has been fishing the Missouri with me for three years and recently caught a six pound Blue cat. I keep a very close eye on him and he has certain rules he must follow such as wearing a life jacket at all times and sitting on the floor when the boat is moving”

“You obviously like to fish for cats. Are you also a Bass fisherman?” I asked.

    “As soon as someone catches a 100 pound bass I’ll try it out laughed Branden”  “I love the fact that catfish get enormous. I fish to relax from my professional life which is quite hectic and stressful. A Bass fisherman has to constantly think as he fishes. Decisions have to be made such as what type of lure to use or what color. The most taxing part of cat fishing is whether I should change my bait after its been on the hook for an hour or if I should have another beer.

   A long mournful blast from a distant train whistle caused me to look towards the back of the boat just in time to see Shani’s rod bending towards the water. The 130 pound woman grabbed it in her small hands and held on for dear life. “Slowly bring the rod tip up and crank the reel as it goes back down” yelled Branden. “You’ve hooked a very big fish. Take your time and you’ll land this baby!” The ensuing battle reminded me of an exhausting 12 round prize fight between two evenly matched opponents. A full 15 minutes later a beautiful 55 pound blue cat found out what the floor of a 20 foot boat looks like. An ecstatic but worn-out Shani couldn’t believe what she had just done. “I was scared and very excited as I fought the fish.” She said. The catfish was very strong and the thought entered my mind several times that I might not have the strength to keep the fight up. I’ve never done any thing like this in my life. It was exhilarating!”

   Over the next hour or so I caught a small 15 pound blue cat and Branden caught a monstrous blue that tipped the scales at 70 pounds. That’s a140 pounds of catfish in just two hours.

 I asked Branden why cat fishing is so great on the Missouri. “They outlawed commercial fishing back in the early 1990s and that really helped” he said. “There are miles and miles of water, plenty of structure and more than enough for them to eat.”

  I’ve always fished with trot lines. That’s how my father and grandfather taught me to catch catfish. I will continue to fish that way but after sampling the peace and tranquility yet excitement and danger the river offers, I will most definitely add rod and reel fishing in the Missouri river to my repertoire.

Like Branden Stombaugh, those adventurous embers are beginning to burn within me.

The Fungus Among Us

The Fungus Among Us

   Every spring from approximately 1965 to 1985 my brother and I went on our annual one day hunting trip with our father. Your typical gear such as shotguns, shells and dogs remained at home. We hunted with our bare hands. The only equipment we needed would be a plastic bag, good walking boots, a can of tick spray and a good pair of eyes.

  Our destination would be the Marais Cygnes Massacre site in eastern Linn county Kansas. I still remember the sign next to the ravine where we parked explaining how on May 19, 1858 thirty men from Missouri under the leadership of Charles Hamilton rode into the Trading Post along the Marais Cygnes River just a few miles west of the state line and captured eleven unarmed Kansas free-state men. The captives were lined up on one side of the ravine while the Missouri men stood on the other side. The order was given to fire. After the smoke cleared, five free-state men lay dead with their six comrades near death beside them. I thought about what happened there each time we quietly walked pass the historical spot to enter the surrounding John Brown hills. Locals from near by towns tell me these hills were named after the abolitionist John Brown who played a huge role in the pre civil war days.

   My brother flanked our father on one side while I maintained an equal distance on the other side of him as we made our way in to the woods. Keeping in site of each other we slowly worked our way up and down hills and across small valleys.

  I liked to take a few steps and stop so I could scan the ground in every direction. Yellow morels can be some what difficult to spot if there are a lot of leaves around them. We always concentrated on places like old wagon trails and barns or open areas in the dense timber.

   A couple of farm houses time had long ago turned to dust still had their ancient foundations jutting up out of the ground like prehistoric dinosaur bones. There always seem to be a few morels growing close to them.

       Giant Elm trees, especially dead ones are excellent places to concentrate on.  Tree stumps will some times have a few around them. We also like to look by any type of large tree that has been blown down by a storm or fallen due to old age.

   Occasionally, you will get lucky and find a mess of morels growing in unlikely places such as beautifully manicured lawns or maybe along a sidewalk in the middle of the city.       

    I once found over thirty growing in a small area next to a grave stone in a northeast cemetery. With our father now deceased and time at a minimum in an increasingly busy world, we usually skip the long drive to Linn county, Kansas and hunt mushrooms on

Cliff Drive

. It’s an excellent place to fill a sack with the nutty tasting delicacies if you’re willing to work at it. Northeast resident and long time hunter, Tony Digerolmno has searched the woods along the cliffs for 12 years with a fair amount of success. The 53 year old normally only finds small ones but once in a while he’ll come across a batch of morels as big as soda pop cans.  

It’s always a good idea to cut the morel at the base instead of pulling it out by the roots.  We also leave a few so they will hopefully reproduce for the next spring hunt. If you spot one be sure and take your time looking all around it. There are usually others close by.

    Warm nights and plenty of rain form the perfect recipe for growing mushrooms. They can literally pop up over night. I like to look early in the morning. A perfect spring day to me is finding a bag full of morels in the morning and catching a stringer full of crappie in the afternoon.  Soak the mushrooms in salt water over night to get rid of bugs. Cut them length wise. Roll the morels and crappie in an egg batter, sprinkle crushed crackers all over both sides and fry in butter until a golden brown and you’ll have a meal fit for a king.

    Mushroom hunters and fishermen have a couple of things in common. Under no condition will they ever tell anyone where their best spots are at and they will some times stretch the truth ever so slightly when bragging about how many fish they caught or how many morels they found.

    Case in point; my co-worker of 20 years and good friend, Dan Daugherty insists that he once had a mushroom dog that could find and point morels as easily as a German Shorthaired Pointer locking down on a cubby of quail. If true, this wondrous animal would be the most incredibly valuable canine in the country. Since no one has actually seen this dog, could it be one of those “Fishing Stories”?

You be the judge. Dan’s favorite quote is, “I’ll never lie to you but I won’t let the truth stand in the way of a good story”.

Happy hunting!

A Forgotten River

 A Forgotten River

      A large, water logged tree trunk who’s origin will never be known, found a temporary home on the banks of the Missouri river within view of downtown Kansas City. Worn smooth from years of exposure to Mother Nature’s elements, it will make a perfect place for the occasional visitor to sit and day dream before heavy spring rains raise the water and free the tree so it can continue its journey down stream.    

   The quiet, tranquil, almost intoxicating view, punctuated with an occasional stunning sunset, can have a soothing, hypnotic affect on a person. Without much of an effort, you can let your imagination take you back in time to the pre civil war days as you watch the swift moving Missouri flow by.  The area where the Missouri and Kansas rivers meet would be much different a hundred and forty plus years ago. The tall Kansas City skyline, inter city viaduct and the bridges crisscrossing the river wouldn’t be there. In their place would be a busy, vibrant water front bustlingly with activity. The deafening blast of a steam whistle would draw your attention downstream where columns of dark black smoke could be seen pouring from the twins stacks of a magnificent steam boat as its powerful engines struggled against the mighty Missouri. Well over a hundred passengers from all walks of life jockey for position on the decks to get a better look at the frontier town of 4,000 people as the boat dodges snags and eases in to the wharf. Stevedores hustle to set the gang plank in position and begin unloading personal belongings and general commodities for the local merchants. I wonder how many of the passengers question whether they made the right decision to leave their homes back east for a new start in the Wild West as they disembarked.

 Unfortunately, we can’t day dream for ever and have to return to reality. Sadly, the hustle and bustle of the water front has been reduced to the barren banks and occasional fishing or tow boat we see today.

   Former northeast resident and river boat pilot, Rick Lynn grew up in a two room shack on the banks of the big muddy about a mile east of the Choteau bridge in the 1950s and remembers a more vibrant river during his childhood.

“It wasn’t at all unusual to see 20 or 30 pleasure boats on the river back then.” Rick said. “People camped on sand bars, fished and pulled skiers up and down the river. I can remember sitting on our dock at night looking across the river at the city dump. They deliberately set the trash on fire every few nights. The flames reflecting across the smooth as glass water created a beautiful view.”

  There were not any marinas on the river to take care of all the boats so Rick’s family started one next to their shack in 1957.

   In addition to the dock, the marina also had a boat ramp, carried fuel for their customers convenience and repaired boats in the fiberglass and machine shops.  At an age when most of us were more worried about playing with our childhood friends, Rick was helping the young business get off to a good start by doing every thing from pumping fuel to working in the repair shops. At age nine, he started driving the jeeps they used for launching close to 5,000 boats in to the river every year at 75 cent each. “It wasn’t that hard.” Rick said. “The jeep had a trailer hitch on the front bumper that made it relatively easy to steer the boat down the ramp.

    With so many people enjoying the river, Rick’s father, Richard, decided to buy his first excursion boat in 1965.  Powered by twin,six cylinder Norburg engines that came out of World War two surplus halftracks, the 69 ton Delores Philly took as many as 200 people at a time up and down the river by the Choteau bridge for twenty years.

   Business was so good that Richard added the 650 passenger Missouri River Queen in 1985.  Built in 1984, she was specificity designed for the rigors of the Missouri river.  It took two weeks to sail her from Paducah, Kentucky to Kansas City. Richard’s third and final boat, The Spirit of America, made it’s appearance in Kansas City in 1990.

   “She was more modern than the Queen, could hold 800 people and looked similar to the love boat.”  Rick said.  “We sold her to the gaming people in 1995. They turned her into a gambling boat for off shore use along the coast of Florida.” 

  The Missouri River Queen was sold in 1998 ending a 30 year run of excursion boats in Kansas City.

    Rick, who served in both the Navy and the Marines, started as a deckhand on the family boats and became a riverboat pilot in 1969.  He achieved the rank of riverboat captain when he earned his 100 ton master mariner license in 1993.

     In his travels, Rick Lynn has seen every thing from heroics to tragic deaths on the Missouri river.

   “It was like a scene out of a movie.” Rick said as he searched his memory. “We were approaching the Hannibal Bridge on a brilliantly blue day when I noticed a man that looked like James Dean on the highest part of the bridge. He was dressed in a white tee shirt and blue jeans. The police were running along the bridge trying to get close enough to talk him down. A helicopter circled over head and a small boat with several officers on board took a position under the bridge. The man calmly took out a cigarette, smoked it and jumped. He popped up like a cork and started swimming like he was in the Olympics. He was handcuffed and placed under arrest when he reached the shore.”

   It was four in the morning on a pitch black night in 1968 when Richard Lynn steered the Queen towards the Choteau bridge. A strong wind was creating white caps across the swirling waters as they went under the bridge. First mate, Nelson Perry was working on the second deck when he heard some thing hit the water hard, which was amazing since he is deaf in one ear and wears a hearing aid in the other one. He was in his late fifties at the time and only had one eye but some how managed to spot the woman who jumped from the bridge struggling in the water. He dove into the dark water from the second deck and reached her in time. The Queen had a full boat of passengers and no other deck hands on board so Richard had no choice but to return to port and contact the authorities. Nelson fought to keep the woman afloat for three hours as the current took them downstream. They were both rescued and Nelson received a presidential citation from President Nixon.

  In another act of heroism, Richard was awarded the Congressional Life Saving metal from Senator Dole for saving a woman who jumped off his boat. He dove in and fought the current to catch up to her. In the fight to try and reach the bank they both became tangled up in a dredge line. Eventually, the couple broke free and made it to the shore. The woman was alive when Richard handed her over to the paramedics but later died.

    It’s any ones guess why the occasional depressed and suicidal person chooses the Missouri river as a place to end their lives. Perhaps they should do just the opposite and embrace the river as a means of self therapy.  A few hours of sitting on the log in the serene place I wrote about might go a long way towards finding inner peace.

  The area where the Lewis and Clark expedition once camped has made such a lasting impression on Rick that he has decided to have his funeral services there when that inevitable day arrives.

   He has purchased an unusual but beautiful coffin that bears a remarkable resemblance to the Missouri River Queen. It will sit high atop a peninsula where the Missouri and Kansas rivers meet below it and the Kansas City skyline towers above it. Rick is donating his remains to science so he will only be there in spirit. Instead of his body the coffin will contain his captains uniform, a boat oar, a box of cigars and a bottle of Jack Daniels. There will be a band, a bag pipe player and Lewis and Clark re-enactors. The public is invited to attend the services. The price will be 20 dollars in advance and 100 dollars at the gate. It will cost you a quarter to peek inside the coffin. All proceeds will go towards the building of a discover center at the confluence of the rivers. The coffin will be on display there along with its contents.

      I think Rick put it best when he said the only news we see about the Missouri river is usually negative such as the discovery of a toxic waste site or a body being found.

   “The reality is, its beautiful.” Rick said. “It’s in better condition now than it ever has been. We have a wonderful resource right here in our back yard and choose to ignore it. Smaller cities and towns up and down the river have better riverfronts than we do.”

    I tried the river for the first time last year and couldn’t agree more. In two evenings, we caught a total of 183 pounds of catfish from our boat. You can safely eat one meal of catfish a week since they are a bottom feeder or practice the catch and release method like I do. I can’t think of a bigger thrill than fighting a fifty pound Bluecat in the swift current of the Missouri and you don’t have to spend a fortune in gas to get there.

  It looks like those hardy pioneers from the 1800s made the right decision after all when they got off the steamships.

Treasure on the Blue

If you were standing on the banks of the Blue River 55 years ago, there’s a good chance you might see a young boy heading downstream in a small, nearly worn out wooden row boat. Slowly propelling the aged vessel with a five-foot-long one-by-four, Ray Elder would scan his surroundings. Enormous cottonwood and sycamore trees lined the banks of a river that was wider and deeper than the one we see today. The shade of the trees stretched half way across the water in some places and must have been a welcome relief from the summer heat as Ray’s boat drifted by. Catch a glimpse of him at just the right moment and you might see his reflection or the reflection of some beautiful puffy white clouds in the water.

At times, dark, ominous clouds would fill the sky above Ray, but it didn’t scare the boy. Storms were a welcomed ally, and the more rain the better. Ray would tie his boat to a stump outside the house trailer he and his parents lived in on the east bank of the river just south of the Truman Road Bridge. As the rain came down, this clever, industrious young man knew a treasure would to come to him within hours.

As he slept, the rain would begin to slowly raise the river level. Muddy water would quietly sneak into the yards of homes along the river and steal anything that wasn’t tied down as it receded. Business on the banks of the Blue weren’t exempt. The river took what it wanted.

Like the streams that brought gold from the mountains to the hard-working miners panning for it in the flatlands, the Blue River brought Ray its own form of gold.

A quarter of a mile downstream from the family trailer, spanning the river from one bank to the other was Ray’s second ally, the Guinotte Dam. It was here that the river's thieving ways were brought to an abrupt end.

To most people, the pile of twisted debris floating against the dam looked like basic flood trash. When the young enterprising Ray looked at that same pile, he saw gold there for the taking.

Countless balls, tires, 55-gallon steel drums and lumber were waiting for him to pluck from the swirling water. The little wooden row boat itself had been a gift from the river after one particularly hard spring rain. It was still floating but taking on water when Ray found it. A few minor repairs later, Ray had yet another ally in his search for treasure.

The Korean War was winding down, but the government still needed rubber for the war effort, so Ray pulled tire after tire out of the river, loaded them into his step father’s grain truck and sold them to the Durbin Corporation at 12th and Elmwood for $17.50 a ton.

He stacked the lumber on the banks so it could dry in the warm sun while he contacted potential customers. Once there was a good amount of balls, they were hauled up to

Truman Road

and Winchester where Ray would spend the afternoon selling them to people driving by.

There was no curbside trash service in those days, so it was fairly easy to sell the steel drums to people for trash burning. Every once in a while, Ray would get really lucky, and one of those drums would have something of value sealed inside, like kerosene. The trailer they lived in was heated by kerosene, so finding 55 gallons of it really helped the family get through the cold winter months.

When the spring turned into summer, the rains weren’t nearly as frequent, which of course meant the river levels stayed low. With his easy source of income now high and dry, our young friend would divert his attention to the small businesses throughout his neighborhood.

Just a block or so due east of their trailer was Fido’s café, home of the 10-inch hotdog. For washing their windows once a week or so, Ray wasn’t paid in cash. Instead, the owner would tell Ray to stop by a couple of times over the next week and he would fix him up with a couple of free hotdogs and something cold to drink.

Next to the restaurant was Olympic Stadium, another source of work. Ray got to show people where to park their cars before races, and he also cleaned under the bleachers and helped repair the parking lot on the weekends.

Saturday nights would find Ray about three-fourths of a mile north of his home in Centropolis. I can picture him waving good-bye to his family as he walked down the railroad tracks on the west side of the Blue River to his job at the café just outside the main gates of Sheffield Steel. It would be early evening, and the sun would be slowly setting as this boy with no worries in the world strolled along the tracks tossing small pieces of gravel at the pigeons searching for grain that had fallen from the passing railroad cars. Once he hit the time clock and slipped on an apron, it was 12 straight hours of washing dishes. The pay for the night was five dollars, all he could eat, and super-clean hands.

The Ford plant back then was located at 12th and Winchester. The new cars were parked across the street from the plant. The truck drivers had to load the cars from work orders, and finding the right ones in a crowded lot was time-consuming; they were always quite happy to see Ray come walking up. The men would give him a list of several cars to look for while they were loading. When he found one, he would hold his hand up to signal where it was. Once all the cars were located, Ray would drag the chains out of the boxes and lay them out on the ground so the drivers could have easy access to them. Not only was it fun to be around all those beautiful new cars, the drivers would usually give him 50 cents for helping.

Recently, Ray and I rode down

12th Street

together so he could show me exactly where the Guinotte Dam used to be. As we drove through Centropolis, he pointed out places that used to be a big part of the once-bustling industrial area – businesses like the American Radiator company, which had made tanks for the military during World War II. They employed a lot of Polish immigrants who once lived near by. If you look closely, you can still see the name Black, Silvers and Bryson on an old building close to the Blue River. Ray’s grandfather worked there at one time as a night watchman.

We walked out to the middle of the

12th Street

Bridge (which didn’t exist when Ray was a child) and stood there for a few seconds while my 69-year-old friend got his bearings. His memory is a thing of beauty as he described even the smallest of details from the past. Years and years ago, his mom showed him a spot just north of the bridge where she used to swing out over the river on a rope and fall into the water as a young girl. The giant cottonwood tree the rope was tied to is gone now but Ray can still show you the exact place where it once provided shade and pleasure to those brave enough to swing from its branches.

One thing that Ray would rather forget is the time he found a body in the river. He noticed something that looked like a man tangled up in a big pile of brush close to the bank. The body seemed to be covered with some kind of black substance. He ran home as fast as he could and had his mom contact the authorities. He went back to the scene and watched as the police pulled the man out of the water. Turns out the poor guy had gotten drunk and fallen off a bridge up river and drowned. Asphalt had stuck to his body as the current took him past a company that dumped its waste into the river.

Ray went on to work as a fire fighter for the Kansas City Fire Department for 35 years and is now the leading authority on its history.

Ironically, the river that brought the little wooden boat to Ray reclaimed it a few years later on a stormy night. Perhaps another young boy farther downstream woke up to find it resting on a muddy bank behind his house.

Little Italy

Little Italy

 

    On a recent Saturday morning as I turned off

Independence Ave

on to Harrison and began driving north I could hear the Holy Rosary church bells signaling the start of a new day. The steady ringing echoed through out the quiet neighborhood known as the Northend, bringing with it a sense of calm and peace.

    My first job after I got married in 1972 was at McCarty truck line which was located on the west side of this little community that sits between Independence Ave on the south, fifth street on the north, I-35 on the east and Holmes on the west.

   Back then, it seems like almost everyone called the area “Little Italy” because of its large Italian population. I used to love driving through this part of historic northeast on my way home every night.

  Nearly every block had several old, well maintained apartment buildings mixed in with smaller homes. Clothes lines heavy with the days wash stretched from one building to another two stories above the ground. On any given night, the smell of garlic from Italian restaurants like Jennie’s and Lucian’s always managed to find its way into my car. I used to catch a glimpse every so often of an old man in a flat cap tending his grape vines in a small back yard.

  Space on front porches and balconies were always at a minimum on hot summer evenings. After a hard days work, the men would sit there trying to solve the world’s problems while the women kept a watchful eye on the children playing on the sidewalks and in the street. On hot steamy days it wasn’t at all unusual for ten or fifteen kids to be seen frolicking in the cool water gushing out of a fire hydrant someone had turned on.

  Whether it was an elderly couple walking hand in hand down the sidewalk or a group of kids playing baseball in a vacant lot, the neighborhood was always bustling with activity.

      I can understand the mysterious hold a woman or the sea can have on a person but can a mere neighborhood such as I have described do the same thing?  Can it be strong enough to hold its residents their entire lives without making any major changes? You better believe it. One block from Garozzo’s Ristorante sits the immaculate home of two charming, attractive women who have lived in the Northend for 91 and 86 years. Known as the Badami sisters by nearly everyone, Anna and Minnie were born just a few blocks away and have lived in the same house since the tender ages of five and one. Both ladies remind me of the short, feisty, loveably character, Sophia Petrillo on the old television series, Golden Girls. The house didn’t have indoor plumbing when the sisters moved there in 1920.As a young girl, Anna with soap and water in hand, trudged out to the old outhouse to scrub it from top to bottom every Saturday. She sure was happy to see it replaced with a modern bathroom.

   Air conditioning was another modern convenience that hadn’t found its way into homes in the 1920s.Hot summer nights sometimes forced the family to sleep outside on the porch. Some relief could be found by placing an oscillating fan behind a block of ice sitting in a shallow pan.  Minnie said this was a period in our country’s history when people left their keys in their cars and left their houses unlocked. She cautioned me not to try sleeping on my porch in today’s violent world.

  Their childhood was filled with wonderful memories but the one that stood out the most was the time they spent with the two African American ladies next door. Anna can’t recall their names but does remember that she affectedly called one of them Nanny. Both of the women were like second moms to the girls for several years. They helped dress them everyday and took them to school. They also helped take care of Mrs. Badami and did a lot of the cooking. Anna can still remember how great the cakes and cornbread were that Nanny would surprise her and Minnie with when they got home from school. Both women died when the girls were in their early teens and it nearly broke their hearts.

At the age of 15, Anne quit school because her father was sick. The family needed her help so she got a job with American Beauty at 5^th and Campbell where she worked for over 50 years.

 As we walked around to the front of the house, Minnie told me she would never forget the parade to celebrate the end of world war two. “The sidewalks were packed with people cheering and crying as our troops marched right down our street. What a wonderful, marvelous site it was.”

  I left the Badami home and walked a couple of blocks south to the home of Henry and Silvia Rizzo. Directly across the street sits the home of their son, Tony and his wife Stephanie who is my middle daughter.

  Silvia and Tony were waiting to walk with me down the same streets they both played on as children. Like Anna and Minnie, they were also born and raised in Little Italy and have lived here their entire lives.

  Their faces brightened as mother and son took turns proudly pointing out not only old places that were once part of their childhood but current homes and businesses as we  slowly walked down the sidewalks.

 “We had just about everything we needed here when I was a girl back in the 1950s and 1960s explained Silvia. Grocery stores, drugstores, beauty shops, bakeries, candy shops, shoemakers, laundry mats and cleaners lined the streets through out our neighborhood”.

   Most of these businesses are gone now but several such as Larocca’s Grocery, Vocci’s Italian Products, Sebeto’s funeral home, Garozzo’s Ristorant, and Lassales are still around and doing  very well. Silvia, who graduated from Northeast High school in 1972 fondly remembers eating Italian ice and playing with her friends at Karnes Park which is now named Columbus Park. It was a simpler time when young people always put a Mr. or Mrs. in front of an older persons name when addressing them. Silvia’s first job as a teenager was at the Don Bosco Community Center. The center has helped acclimate thousands of immigrants to the Northeast area over the years. Countless families in the Northend have spent many hours there participating in activities such as basketball, boxing, sewing and pottery just to name a few.

  Tony remembers there being mostly older people living in the area when he was growing up. You didn’t see very many people outside like you did when his mom was a child. The neighborhood was slowly declining. Many homes were razed to make way for the construction of I-35 and quite a few houses were lost to urban renewal.

  Stephanie was a little worried about crime and property values when they decided to build a new home there two years ago. After all, it was a huge investment in an area that had been slowly going down hill for a decade or so. Tony and his parents assured her that just the opposite was true. A new restaurant and several art galleries had recently opened and some of the bigger apartment buildings were being turned into lofts.

    Once settled in the new house she quickly learned what it was that kept families like the Badami’s and Rizzo’s living in the small tree lined neighborhood for generations. It was really quite simple. The urban ambiance, the quietness, the closeness to downtown, easy walking distance to the city market and river front park and most importantly, great neighbors that look out for each other.

  As the setting sun began to cast shadows across the front of Holy Rosary church I noticed several residents coming out on their balconies to soak it all in and I realized that my daughter made the right decision. Little Italy is back and better than ever.

 

The Dream Ride

The Dream Ride

    I can’t begin to remember how many hours my buddies and I whiled away drinking cherry phosphates at Freddie’s soda fountain in the old Fordview drugstore forty five years ago.  It was an excellent place to spend the long lazy days of summer vacation from Henry Clay grade school. Spinning around on the stools with our short legs still several inches from the floor, we would complain about there being nothing to do. Many times, just when it seemed we would surely die from boredom, the alarm at the fire station next door would shatter the quietness with its frantic ringing.

   Like adults leaving work on a Friday evening, we tore out of the drugstore at break neck speed for the station. With any luck at all we would get there in time to see the firemen exhibit a wondrous blend of coordination, speed and agility as they scrambled to get on the truck.

  It was a site as impressive as a stealth bomber flying over head today when the American La-France pumper came blasting out of the fire house on to Independence Avenue with three men riding on the back hanging on for dear life as their Dalmatian “Sparky” ran along the top of the truck furiously barking.

  We always watched until the truck was completely out of site before slowly walking back to our melting drinks at the soda fountain. Everyone was in total agreement that we would all become firemen when we grew up or at the very least, take a ride in a fire truck some day. That day never came for any of us but I recently met a man that did turn his boyhood dream into reality many years later.

   Permanently etched in John Broski’s memory is the day he and his father left the family fence business in Leeds industrial district to head for home. But first, his dad wanted to show him something a few blocks away. The six year old boy couldn’t quite see over the dash board as they pulled into the parking lot but once he pushed open the heavy car door his eyes took in a site that he would never forget. A single bay fire station in all its glory stood just a few feet away. Like the Sirens sisters in Greek Mythology who lured sailors to their island with beautiful, captivating songs, the glistening red fire truck just inside the open door seem to have the same affect on him.

  To say that young John was impressed with what he saw in that small fire house was a gross under statement. He decided that very day to begin collecting fire department memorabilia. To his delight, a brand spanking new Doepke pumper truck was patiently waiting for him under the tree the very next Christmas to become the first of hundreds over the next fifty years of collecting.

   John and his charming wife Sue recently invited me out to their cozy home in Overland Park for a private tour. The swirling leaves of Autumn did very little to hide the 300 pound fire hydrant sitting on their porch as I pulled into the driveway. Above the hydrant in the exact colors of the Overland Park fire department trucks was the address of the house.

  A step through their door is a step back in time. Shelves in virtually every room strain under the weight of fire trucks I didn’t even know existed. Most of them are made from steel and are as shiny and beautiful as the day they were bought.

  A large assortment of hoses and nozzles old enough to vote shared one corner of the living room. I grabbed one of the nozzles and was quite surprise at how much it weighed. I can see why it takes several men to handle one with water rushing through it.

   Several Sparky the fire dogs helped Smoky the Bear keep an eye on me as I looked at everything from fire axes to Gamewell fire alarm pull boxes.

   I even watched an old home movie that John’s father took of him in 1956 showing the six year old playing with his first fire equipment. John’s uncle Fay Parrish who was a fire fighter at the Ford Claycomo plant showed him how to lace white shoestrings emulating fire hose in the back of his toy Doepke Pumper so it would flake out as he pulled it away from something like a table leg. I was amazed at how creative he was in the movie. The fire scene this young boy had set up was fantastic. It looked like a three alarm fire with trucks and emergency equipment every where. Shoe strings ran across the floor and up ladders to continue across kitchen chairs simulating roof tops.

   With such a passionate love for the fascinating world of fire fighting it only seems fitting that “Johnny the Fireman” as his father used to call him, take a ride on a fire truck after waiting nearly 50 years.

  That day came back in 2002 when his good friend and Overland Park fire fighter Trevor Miller asked him to come spend the entire day at fire station number 42.

  The morning was slow and uneventful. Everyone including the fire alarm got plenty of rest except John. This was the day he had been waiting for since he was a kid and he wasn’t about to sit around and watch television or read.

  After giving the station a good once over Trevor took him to the room where they keep the personal protective equipment. John was given the ok to try on anything he liked. It took a long time but he managed to put on a bunker pants, boots, coat, gloves, Nomex , hood, suspenders, helmet, mask, oxygen tank and air hoses.

  It wasn’t until he had all this gear on that he realized it was extremely heavy and hot.

  A good six hours into the shift the alarm finally went berserk. With the precision of a finely tuned watch, the men donned their gear and took the assigned positions on Quint 42. John’s heart beat a mile a minute as he slid onto the seat between two fire fighters.

   With the sirens blaring and a near deafening blast of the air horns the crew left the friendly confines of the fire house and began yet another mission. 

   This entire experience is so surreal John thought as he watched the trucks flashing red and blue lights reflect off the windows in store fronts along

95th street

. A quick glance at his comrade’s faces showed John that this was indeed serious business. All they knew was that they were headed for an accident scene involving two vehicles that would require their undivided attention. Focus and concentration would be part of their over all equipment as they grew closer to the accident. Each man wore headphones so Captain Wernicke could relay any new information that might come in.

  With a hiss of the air brakes, everyone jumped out of the truck and went to work. A halligan tool was used to pop the doors off one car. Hoods were opened and electrical cables cut to prevent a possible fire or deployment of the air bags. Once the situation was under control and safe, they stepped back so the paramedics could do their job. With the task completed it was time to head back to the firehouse where the equipment they used would be cleaned and checked so it would be ready for the next run.

   John couldn’t wait to get home so he could tell Sue about his exciting day. Every single detail, no matter how small would be retold several times over the next two hours. Sue had no interest in the fire department when they were married 15 years ago but now knows as much as John and shares his love and admiration for a service most of us take for granted.

  Overland Park is trying to start a fire department museum at the Deanna Rose Farmstead. If they succeed, the Broski’s wonderful collection may some day grace their shelves for all to see.

 

The Mystique of the Sea

The Mystique of the Sea

         The old man standing on the wharf kept a close eye on me as I parked my car next to a warehouse along the harbor in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Before getting out of the car, I watched him for a couple of minutes as he slowly strolled around the area with his hands behind his back. My guess is he’s an old fisherman many years past retirement that comes down here every day for a couple of hours to watch the trawlers bring in their catch and reminisce about his younger days at sea.  He probably logged more years on a fishing boat than I’ve been alive.

   Do you know where they’re unloading the Alexis Martina at?” I finally asked him. He gave me a long distrusting look, pointed towards a warehouse thirty feet away and answered me in Portuguese. I could still hear him rambling on in his native language as I opened the heavy steel door and entered the building.

   Several men on the far side of the room were extremely busy taking fish off a short conveyer and packing them in large boxes followed by ice. At the opposite end of the conveyer was the 98 foot long trawler, Alexis Martina.

  First mate, Matt Jackson motioned for me to come on board but warned me to be careful. “The deck can get pretty slick while were unloading 30,000 pounds of fish” the 25 year old said as he lowered two hooks hanging from a cable through a 3 by 4 foot hole in the floor.     

   A long climb down a steep ladder put me fifteen feet below the deck in an area called the fish hold. I watched as 23 year old Jeremy Reposa grabbed the hooks and attach them to a plastic tote full of fish covered with ice. The tote was immediately pulled back up through the opening to a man on the deck who deposited it on the conveyer where it would be taken to the men in the warehouse.

   “It takes me five solid hours to unload 30,000 pounds of Whiting” Jeremy said as he slid yet another of the 50 pound containers into position and waited for the hooks to come back down. “My father, Peter Reposa, bought the Alexis Martina in 1992. I used to go out to sea with the crew when I was younger but don’t have time any more. After college I started a construction company which keeps me very busy but I always come down to help unload the weeks catch.”

   The room we were in appeared to be about 30 by 20 feet with several separate chambers where totes are stacked from the floor to the ceiling with the capacity to hold 200,000 pounds of fish or squid.  It was wet, cold and most definitely smelled like fish.

  I’ve seen the ten most dangerous occupations in the world many times on television and commercial fishing consistently ranks in the top five. I learned from Jeremy and the crew that many things can make the job hazardous.

  Steel cables can cut a man in half if you’re not paying close attention to what you’re doing. Get to close to one of the many winches on deck and you might lose a hand or arm. Giant fishing nets can easily drag a crewman into the ocean if you get your feet tangled up in one.

   Fishing through out the night brings on additional risks because of the darkness but it’s the ideal time since whiting feed together in big schools making it easier to catch them. 

    Raging storms have been known to unleash their awesome power on the Alexis Martina. Jeremy can remember 60 mph winds sending waves crashing over the deck but the men continued to work.

    The crew quits fishing for whiting at the end of summer and switch to squid from October to April. There is a 30,000 pound limit on the whiting but no limit on how many squid you catch. Unfortunately, old man winter brings with it additional safety concerns such as machinery freezing up and ice forming on the deck which can be absolutely treacherous. The squid have to be packed in ice just right or they can spoil and create toxic fumes that can be deadly if inhaled. A non skid surface was recently put on the deck which should greatly improve safety.

   . The Alexis Martina only travels at ten knots with its twin diesel engines so it takes a full 24 hours to steam 250 miles out to sea where they will fish for approximately five days with very little sleep. Jeremy remembers fishing for 49 straight hours with out any sleep at all when they were in a no lay time zone. Rules and regulations in certain places designate that you can’t stop your boat. The boat has to be constantly moving as you drag your nets across the bottom of the ocean.

    Between nine in the morning and one o’clock in the afternoon is when the men can normally grab four hours of much needed rest.   

   “Why do you risk life and limb to work in such harsh and dangerous conditions?” I asked Jeremy. “Can’t you just bring the boat back in when the weather gets bad?”

  “Well” Jeremy said. “Some captains will return but most of them will keep working because they spend all that time and fuel steaming getting out there and don’t want to come back without making any money. The expenses are so great that they’re willing to take risks to fill the hold with fish.    

   On the average, one trip will cost $3500 for fuel. Eight tons of ice will run about 30 cents a pound. A weeks worth of food has to added to the over all expenses. Payments on the boat which is worth about $1,250,000 are very high as one might imagine.

  I noticed that the four man crew all appeared to be in their twenties. “You’re right” Jeremy said. “Older men usually have families so they can’t be out to sea as much as the young single men. Just as soon as we’re unloaded we will immediately head back out to our favorite fishing waters and go back to work.”

   Three of the crewmen are college graduates so the obvious question is, “Why aren’t they sitting behind a desk some where in a nice comfortable office instead of fishing for a living?” “Money” was Jeremy’s quick reply. “They all get a cut from each catch we bring in. It can vary from trip to trip as the fish prices fluctuate but on the average, each man will make over $60,000 a year.”

   That sounds like a pretty good reason to me but maybe there is some thing more to it. Some thing deep within every crewman that will continue to grow stronger with each passing day at sea.

   The old man on the wharf knows what it is.

Grandmas Root Cellar

Grandma’s Root Cellar

  A walk along the west side of grandma’s old two story clapboard house was an interesting one. A rusty 55 gallon barrel sat under the gutter collecting rain water. A screen lay across the top to keep mosquitoes and young boys like myself out of it. “If I catch you messing with that rain barrel boy, I’ll skin you alive” grandma would always say when I got to close to it. That was in 1956 and 48 years later, I can still picture her standing there with her hands on her hips staring at me with that stern look on her face. Grandma was a very loving woman but very strict. She told you to do something once and only once. I think that’s why so many people loved and respected her.

 A few feet past the rain barrel was her prized procession, the herb garden. It ran right next to the house for probably ten feet or so. She grew herbs for just about anything that ailed you. There was some mint growing in the garden that was just fantastic in her tea. If you were real lucky, there might be a couple of apple pies cooling in the window above the herbs. The combined smells were mighty pleasing to the old nose.

  Next in line was the old well with its little roof and winch that a person would crank on to raise a bucket of the coldest, sweetest tasting water I ever drank. I’m 54 years old now and can remember that the dipper we used to get the water out of the bucket was white with blue trim and made out of metal.

  The last thing on that side of the house was two huge lilac bushes. Years before, grandma was smart enough to make sure she planted them right outside her bedroom window so she could smell the wonderful scent of their blooms in the spring. An added bonus was the little jenny wren houses hanging among the branches of the lilacs. It’s pretty tough to beat lying in bed on a Sunday morning smelling lilacs in your bedroom while listening to wrens sing.

   A second rain barrel led the way to the back yard. The water it stored was used exclusively for washing our hair. The first barrel was used for watering the herbs only.

The backyard was as big as four football fields and as pretty as a picture. A vegetable garden stretched for at least a hundred feet in each direction. A home made scarecrow guarded each end of it. Scarecrows that were only five feet tall but looked at least ten feet tall to a six year old boy that had to walk past them in the dark to the outhouse. The outhouse had your typical two seats with the little half moon on the door. Beyond the out house stood the heavily wooded John Brown hills. They were an excellent place to hunt for morel mushrooms in the spring.

   The back of the house had several big wash tubs hanging on nails along with axes and hammers. An old hand operated cultivator for the garden leaned against a stump. I once saw grandpa use an axe to cut the head off a chicken on that same stump. I’ll never forget that as long as I live. That scared me half to death. A big wooden table that always stayed outside next to the garden was used to clean anything from squirrels to big catfish. There was a small pump next to it that was situated so that the water would run across the table when pumped by hand. That’s a pretty nice setup for the 1950s now that I think about it.

   The east side of the house was home to just one thing and that was the root cellar which was my favorite thing in the entire yard. Other than the heavy oak door, the impressive structure was made of limestone rock. Most of it was under ground with maybe five feet above ground. Several feet of dirt covered it and a small vent pipe rose out of the back part for a couple of additional feet. This was an excellent vantage point to have when my cousins and I had dirt clod fights. The door was always kept locked and only grandma had the key. I remember the first time I got to go inside the cellar.

   “Grab as many of those mason jars as you can boy and come with me” grandma said as she fished around in her huge apron pockets for the key. The old door creaked and moaned as she lifted and latched it to a steel eyelet. We descended at least ten steps and came to another door just as big as the first. I was a little nervous yet very curious to see what was in this secret place in the ground. As the door was pushed open a blast of cool air hit me followed by a strange musty smell. It was as dark as a cave inside. I heard the sound of a match being lit and could then vaguely make out what looked like shelves. Grandma use the match to light kerosene lanterns hanging at opposite ends of the room.

    I could see very well now. I was told to shut the door so the cold air wouldn’t escape. I was right about the shelves. They ran along all four walls from the floor to the ceiling.  The room was probably 10 feet wide and 20 feet long. There were a couple of old chairs and a great many baskets of potatoes and apples in the middle of the floor. A half a dozen or more bags hung from the ceiling with so many onions in them, it looked like they would burst. The shelves were filled with roll after roll of brightly colored mason jars filled with just about every vegetable and fruit known to man. Most of it came from grandma’s garden. I asked her why she kept all this food in the cellar and she told me that it had to last them the entire winter and the cool air would help it do just that.

    The sun nearly blinded me when we climbed back out of the cellar. I’d completely forgotten how hot and humid it was outside. As grandma and I walked hand in hand back to the front of the house to get some pie and tea, I could see grandpa building another wooden boat in his boat house. Seems like he was always either there or in the smoke house but that’s another story for another time.

American Nostagia

American Nostagia

  The cavernous trunk of the 1952 Chevy smelled bad enough to gag a maggot. It was pitch black, extremely hot and as uncomfortable as it gets lying on top of fishing gear, gas cans, tools and tires. The constant motion of the car moving through traffic was beginning to make me sick. It was getting difficult to breathe. Within a few minutes my suffering would be over.

  The car slowed down and came to a stop. I could hear muffled voices. The old Chevy started moving forward again. I could hear and feel the tires crunching gravel as we slowly drove over countless small hills.

   The brakes squealed slightly as the car came to a full stop. My heart was pounding as I heard the driver put the car in park and pull the emergency brake. A heavy door slammed shut and foot steps could be heard coming towards me.

  A key jiggled around in the lock for couple of seconds and the trunk lid was quickly opened. Fresh air, darkness and my buddy greeted me as I jumped out of the trunk.

All I had to do now was get in the car as fast as possible without being seen. If a 1952 Chevy was as short as today’s cars, I might have made it. I don’t think I took more than five steps when I came face to face with the manager of the I-70 Drive-in and he wasn’t very happy.

    He said we could do one of three things. He could call my dad and let him deal with me, he could have the police give me a ride down to the station or I could go back to the ticket booth and pay like everyone else. I wasn’t the brightest teenager in the world but I was certainly smart enough to go with choice number three. He wrote down my drivers license number and said choice number three wouldn’t be an option if he ever caught me trying to sneak in again.

  I learned my lesson and probably became one of their better customers through out the 1960s as a teenager. At one time, thousands of Drive-ins covered the America landscape. Their numbers have dwindled to just a few hundred with three still in the Kansas City area.

   I was quite happy to find out that the I-70 Drive-in is still open and doing very well these days. I stopped there recently to talk to owner Daryl Smith. Other than there being four screens instead of one, very little has changed since I saw my last movie there over 30 years ago.

 A lot of memories came rushing back as I drove under the familiar arch at 8701 40 highway. The ticket booth and concession stand are still in the same place as they were when I was a teenager. Driving over the little hills and carefully dodging all the speaker stands made me start thinking about those hot summer nights sitting in the car under the stars with my girl friend or hanging out with a couple of buddies watching movies on the 50 by 90 foot screen. I remember going there on double dates in the winter hoping the electric heaters they provided would quit working so our dates would have to snuggle up to us to stay warm.

   A lot of people loaded the back of their pickups with coolers, lawn chairs, blankets, pillows and kids. They backed into their space next to the speaker stand, unfolded the chairs against the cab and laid out the blankets by the tail gate so the kids would eventually fall asleep on them. All that was left to do was ease into the lawn chairs, put your feet on the cooler and watch movies for several hours.

  As I pulled up to the concession stand where several employees were busy getting ready to open for the evening I noticed hundreds of birds eating something on the ground. “That’s yesterday’s popcorn” explained Daryl. “I see no point in throwing it in the trash when the birds will eat it”

   Daryl graduated from Van Horn high school 1964 and worked at I-70 as a box office cashier during his college years. After a stint in the Untied States Army and a tour of Vietnam, Daryl entered the theater business in 1971. He bought the 1,400 car capacity I-70 Drive-in in 1999.

  I don’t have the best memory in the world but other than the prices I really don’t think the inside of the concession building has changed any. I remember walking along the counter as a kid with my date watching what she put on her tray and hoping I had enough money to pay for it. Maybe that’s where I learned to quickly add up figures in my head.

  I always wondered what the projection room above the concession building looked like and got my chance to see it when Daryl introduced me to manager John Candy. Like the sacred elephant burial grounds, a giant pile of ancient car speakers stared back at John and I as we made our way past them to the stairs.

  No fewer than eight huge movie projectors came into view as we reached the top step. Several large turn tables and plenty of 35 mm film filled the large room. The temperature is kept nearly as cold as an operating room in the hospital to keep the film and equipment in good shape.

  I asked how many people it took to run all the equipment and was very surprised when John told me just one and that person spends very little time there. It’s automated for the most part. Once the projection man gets all four movies started he goes back downstairs to other duties. But what happens if some thing goes wrong with one of the projectors and the movie quits running I asked? John laughed and said hundreds of customers will start flashing their lights and honking their horns to alert the staff.

  Even though you can now listen to the movies on your car radio, Daryl still has the old speakers you can set on your car window for those of us that like to bring back the days of our youth. You can see two movies for seven dollars per person. Children eleven and under get in free.

  That’s a pretty good deal for a slice of American Nostagia