52 Ancestors Week 42: Sports

From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 42 is "Sports." Sports can bring a lot of enjoyment to our families, either as participants or spectators. Any sports memorabilia get passed down? Does your family have a traditional Thanksgiving Day football game? 

Clever way to avoid copyright issues. ;) Of course we all know it's the Garden!

    It's week 42 for 52 Ancestors and the name of the game is sports! Growing up in Salem, New Hampshire meant that everyone followed all of the major professional teams from Boston and the minor league and college teams as well. We have every sport covered! If you want to watch basketball, we have the Boston Celtics. If you want to watch football, we have the New England Patriots. The list goes on and on. However, there are other sports we New Englanders take part in and they don't require you to have an amazing amount of athletic skill. Though, some muscle would help and you do need a license.

Fine vessels!

    For as long as I can remember, my family has been one with a proud maritime tradition as people on both sides of my family tree loved to fish whether it was in Italy or on the Merrimack river. Fishing is quite literally in my blood as we've always had a boat docked at Ring's Island Marina, which is right across the river from scenic Newburyport.

    I'm pretty sure I've told that story many time before in the blog. Years before my father first put his first boat, "Articulator", into the water, my mother's side was already making waves on the Merrimack. Though my great-grandparents, Austin Felker and Henrietta Legault had a home in Haverhill, Mass they too enjoyed riding their skiff on the river.

    My mother has told me about how they had a house on nearby Plum Island and from there she and her brothers and sisters would go out to the beach and toward the clam flats to dig up worms and fish for flounder. They would bring home all the flounder they could carry and have a feast fit for a king! It's sad now to think about it because these days you are limited to only ten flounder per person and they have to be within a certain size due to very sound fishing regulations. I'm not arguing with them. 

    Fishing for flounder wasn't the only thing Austin taught his grandchildren to fish for. At the mouth of the Merrimack lurks a small fish that is the true terror of the deep because it is so mind-numblingly easy to catch. Seriously. All you have to do is sit by the side of the boat, drop the line in with a hook and in minutes you'll be knee deep in mackerel. You get more if it's a clear day. The fish see one friend get caught and they all follow. No one ever said these fish went to school, guys. Wow, I can hear your boos. Your boos gives me strength! 

Master anglers!

    While fishing at the mouth can be entertaining, it's not without its dangers. Remember that blog about how Austin and Henrietta's skiff hit that Coast Guard boat? Read about it here. That's only the tip of the iceberg. The waters where the Atlantic meets the river can be quite treacherous if you're not careful. Even my father, a seasoned sailor, had to contend with choppy waters! I even once saw a guy on a kayak at the mouth. He was either living his best life or was looking for some "adventure".

    The waves and wakes of other boats tend to add to the challenge of catching a fish as my great-grandparents found out the day they were saved. Don't worry. They both survived. I will say that it's interesting that neither my mother nor her five other siblings ever heard of that story! I guess they kept it under wraps until their great-grandson reeled the information up from the bottom of the Newburyport Library Archive. Whoops! Sorry, Austin and Henrietta! I was just curious!! I'm sure you were both hardy sailors!

    Fishing with the Felkers also brought the whole family together. Not just my mother and her siblings were out there on the water. Taking part in the fishing expeditions was usually several of their cousins and they would spend the night at their grandparents' house on Plum Island before fishing in the morning.  This was in the 1960s and chances were very good that they used the same skiff that was involved in the accident some thirty years prior. What can I say? They built ships to last in those days. I wish I had a picture of the skiff.

Rocking a Darkwing Duck shirt with my dog. 
What?

    We do have plenty of pictures of the "Articulator" and all of the ships to bear the name "Enterprise"....I mean "Toothfairy". Fishing brought a lot of enjoyment to me and my family for a long time and it's good to know that it's in my blood because I love fishing. It's also not just the Felkers who fished because you can bet my grandpa Hamel would also be on the Merrimack as well as family from my father's side.

    Fishing has a way of bringing people together because not only is it a sport. It's also a social activity where stories can be told, skills can be passed down and fan can be had by everyone provided you don't get seasick!

    While my family didn't have Thanksgiving Day football games or anything like that, my father still taught my brother and I the basics of fishing and I enjoyed every moment of it--mainly because I often caught more fish than my brother ever did. Let's be honest. That's the only reason I loved fishing! Yeah, we got a little competitive on the deck. Haha! Still, it's great to be part of a fishing tradition that spanned several decades. 

See ya next time!