Those Days

[Beekissed]

Doesn't West Virginia still have good fishing?

Nope....most of the streams are polluted and too warm to support good life, all the rocks are covered with some kind of algae and all the fish are long gone. They stock certain streams with trout each year, which are promptly fished out by the locals who have relatives working at the hatcheries and can tell them exactly when they are coming.

The river of my golden summers used to be FULL of large muskie, bass, and all kinds of various game fish...now you can't even catch a creek chub there.

 

[digitS']

@Collector , I have a wrench and a sledgehammer with Dad's initials on them. They are bound to last forever, I hope my kids have an interest in them. They might be able to remember Dad using them but I doubt that they will see them as treasure. You be careful with that bottle !

Nope....most of the streams are polluted and too warm to support good life

Is that from mining wastes, Bee'? Disturbing ground too close to streams? Coal ash pits?

We have streams where placer mining was done that are nonexistent. By that I mean, the water is underground and no longer reaches the surface. Gone.

The human toll is terrible to think about. Our "49'ers" were usually out by themselves during appropriate times of the year. The indigenous people, for the most part, didn't want them there. So, the miners were very vulnerable to attack. What to do? Water too high to work the stream - get together and go shoot Indians.

Steve

 

[Beekissed]

Is that from mining wastes, Bee'? Disturbing ground too close to streams? Coal ash pits?

Nope...not in that manner. WV is not only known for mining, having her natural resources stripped out by the carpet baggers from way back, she also is being milked of her oil and natural gas, while bordering the Ohio River and playing host to many, many chemical companies~Dupont, GE, Chevron....you name it, it's here in WV.

Over the years we've become a tired old lady, well used by the world for her natural beauty and riches lying under the soil. Our streams are dead and dying, our wildlife diminishing, our farms dying out and being sold off for the gas and oil underneath them and the timber on top of them, and our economy, which should be thriving with all this business going on, tanking, merely because we are used but not benefiting from any of the riches being made here.

 

[Zeedman]

When I first read this thread, I thought "I've got nothing". Then two things sparked some memories, and this was the first.

Watched "A River Runs Through It" with DW on Saturday... and it brought back memories of summer days in my youth, spent on my grandfather's land. The property was remarkably similar to that in the movie; no mountains obviously (it was in central Wisconsin), but hilly, heavily wooded, and a loop of the Little Wolf River was one boundary of the property. It was 1/2 square mile of wonderfully diverse habitat: ridges of pine & hemlock above the river; stands of oak & maple on the hills; tamarack bogs; cold springs emerging from the hillsides above the river - and an island in the river big enough to camp on, complete with its own sand beach. Where a spring emerged from the hillside, Grandfather drove a pipe in & hung a cup there, that water was ice-cold even on the hottest summer day. The adjoining land on one side was owned by the timber company... so you could walk a mile in that direction before leaving the forest.

I often spent weekends with my grandparents as a teenager, and that land was my private paradise. Grandfather taught me wood lore, and I spent days helping him gather wood for the Winter, or helping Grandmother pick whatever wild fruit was in season... mostly blackberries, wild strawberries (the best kind, IMO), or wild cherries. I fished often (with limited success) and watched my grandfather wage a running battle with a big trout that he knew was hiding in an eddy formed by a large spring. I remember him coming up the path one day beaming with pride, a trout in his hand as big as a small salmon. As a youth, I took those days - and my grandparents' love - for granted. It saddens me that I wasn't there to know them as one adult to another, and to tell them how much they meant to me.

When I turned 18, I joined the Service; and two years later, my grandmother passed away. I was able to return several years later, with my wife & children, in time for my grandfather to meet them... and shortly thereafter, he too passed on. His land - which had been in the family since his father first cleared 40 acres to farm - was broken up into smaller plots & sold. I've debated often over the years whether I want to drive out & see that land again... or whether I should just leave my fond memories untarnished. If I decide to go, I hope that at least one of the new owners proves to be friendly, so I can tell them stories about growing up there, and perhaps walk a familiar path, if any of them are still there.

 

[Carol Dee]

Summers of '74 and '75... long, golden summers filled with LIFE at full throttle and I was just a little girl, but I got to see it all, hear it all, taste it all. There was even a huge, flaming meteor that went right over our house that summer of '75 and I got to see that too.

The best music, the most crisp, sparkling soda pop, the best ball games involving all the kids in the neighborhood, the best fishing, the greatest cars....sigh...they were my halcyon summers. Those summers stand out in my mind like no others before nor since as being the most of everything good a little kid could want to experience.

I wish my kids could have experienced it with me...I think then they'd have a clue as to what they missed as the telling of it doesn't do it justice.

AMEN

 

[Nyboy]

I see my grandparents house every time I visit my dad.

 

[thistlebloom]

I have been back as an adult to scenes of golden childhood memories, mostly the ones spent at my grandparents house and surrounding neighborhood.

I wish now that I hadn't. I wish that those memories could stay pristine, because now, even though I still have those fond memories (where everything was much bigger and grander) I also have that adult overlay of a new reality that's a bit tarnished and sad.

 

[digitS']

I have mentioned this on TEG, before.

As a young man, I built a log cabin in the woods. The first new owners set a mobile home right beside it. That's how things stood for about 20 years. During that time, they decided to put siding on the cabin.

Trees were thinned between the homesite and the road. I could just see the mobile home driving by. Dad wasn't too happy about the trees being taken out because he held a second mortgage and changes were not supposed to be made to the existing resources. A neighbor told him to leave when he came by to check.

Something was wrong but Dad could keep an eye on the trees from the road. He told me about the siding. The owners soon paid off the second mortgage.

About 2000, the property was sold, the mobile home towed away. The new owner lives in the cabin; it still has the siding. I've been able to check on the place since the advent of the internet and online satellite pictures. The barn recently disappeared! I don't want to go back and see my log cabin covered with siding.

Steve

 

[aftermidnight]

My fondest memories and some of the happiest days when I was very young were where I spent summers at my grandparents cottage by the sea, this was in the 40's.
The anticipation I felt as we rattled down a dirt lane just off the main road. I still remember that feeling of excitement so well as grandpa got out of the car to unlock the gate, the drive to the garage (pronounced like carriage) was bordered on one side by a row of grapes on a fence, of course no ripe grapes that time of year, as we rounded the corner the scent from a row of lavender wafted through the air.
Now don't get me wrong, although they had a home in town and a summer cottage my grandparents were not rich, he was a retired coal miner. No indoor plumbing at the cottage but there was water in the scullery once the pump was primed. To get to the garage or outhouse you walked along a winding flag stone path under a rustic rose covered pergola, there was a bench built in halfway where one could sit and smell the roses or just sit and daydream.
His love of growing things rubbed off on me I used to think even then one day I will have a garden just like grandpa's. He grew everything, veggies, fruit and flowers. I used to help him carry buckets of water from the well and watch while he ladled out water to each plant, when the bucket was empty I'd run back and man the pump and fill another. He grew a lot of old fashioned flowers like snapdragons and pinks foxgloves and canterbury bells, the cup and saucer type, there was a lot of these at the back in among the tall grass in the wild part of the garden. I used to plunk down and watch the clouds roll by usually falling asleep only to wake when I heard someone calling my name.
He also took cuttings from carnations, just stuck them in the ground and they grew. The cabbages and onions he grew were whoppers and the potatoes, don't know the variety but they tasted so good, he use to haul kelp up from the beach for his potato patch.

The cottage had 2 bedrooms a dining sitting room where we sat to listen to the noon news, I had to very quiet then or I got that look from grandma. In the kitchen the cupboards had glass doors. a lot of the dishes were pink depression glass and I remember a few plates with one of the king and queens on them, the kitchen also had a small scullery. The long covered back porch where we ate most of our meals also had a leather couch where I used to take a nap on a hot afternoon. Grandpa was from Yorkshire and I loved to sit and listen to him talk, accent and all. It gave me a safe, warm, fuzzy feeling.

In the evenings if the tide was in he'd roll the boat down the tracks and the three of us went out. Grandpa would put the hand line in with one of his favorite spoons on, and row around, he never came home skunked. Some days if the tide was out we'd gather oysters or dig clams. He also beach combed for logs to use as firewood, when he found one he used a tool he had to roll it down to the waters edge, put a spike in and tow it home, I'd ask him if I could row, with a smile on his face he'd change places with me, He'd let me row until I got tired which took all of 5 minutes and I doubt if we moved more than a couple of inches, hey, I was only 7 or 8 at the time.
When we came back to live here once again I was married and we had 3 children. I got hubby to drive out to where I could walk along the beach, yes the cottage was still there boathouse and all but there was a big ugly concrete patio in front of the cottage, we drove around the backside, the road went almost up against the back door, the property had been subdivided and only the rich live there now. I almost wished we hadn't gone to have a look but I still have and cherish these memories to this day, it was these times that got me through a pretty rough childhood. The only regret I have is that he passed before I was old enough to tell him how very much these times with him meant to me.

 

[Nyboy]

sounds like you had great grandparents