there were no radios or cell phones as there are today. Sometimes in fog you would have to stop the engine to listen for the foghorn. If you were broken down with engine trouble, an car would be held in the air with an oil coat on the end for a flag. Oil coats were always black.

Traps were hauled by hand. It wasn’t until the late 1940’s that the first trap haulers came along. They were called “niggerheads’, a term you certainly would not use today. Haulers were powered by small air- cooled engines. You would wind the rope around the hauler a couple of times and it would haul your boat along to the next trap. Measuring lobsters began about the middle of the 1940’s. They were measured from the end of the horn to the end of the tail, and had to be 7 inches. Because the horns broke off easily, we moved to the back measure which is still used today. I can remember the price of lobsters being as low as 6 cents a pound. Those who fished packers' gear would get 1 cent less than the independent fishermen. A new dory cost $50.00. A license cost 25 cents.

There was one small wharf on the Island for everyone to use, but it wasn‘t a fishing wharf such as we have today. Instead, most fishermen “fished off the shore”, which meant boats were anchored in deep water, and you’d row out to them in a small boat or dory. Boats would be sailed into the shore as close as you could, then haul your traps out to the boat wading through the water in your long rubber boots. Landing the traps at the end of the season was done much the same way. You’d sail your boat in until she hit the shore and then the traps would be thrown off both sides. Sometimes horses and drag sleighs would be used at low tide to take the traps off the beach. The first money I ever earned was hauling traps from the beach to Albert Griffin’s factory yard. For this I was paid a cent a trap, and I earned $30.00.

Almost everyone caught and salted their own bait. Nets were set in the bay and hauled by hand. Herring was very plentiful. You would take what you needed and leave the rest for others to take from your nets as well. Bait shacks were set up in front of the shanties to salt the herring.

Lobsters were also very plentiful. I can remember watching from the school yard as they would haul lobster from one factory to the other by horse and wagon. They often caught more than the factories could pack. Sometimes the lobsters that would die in the wooden crates were hauled away and spread on the land. All the lobster shells from the factories were also spread on the land for fertilizer.

Most lobsters were “packed" or canned as it was also called on 67