250413 3 men and a boy

This picture was me in 1959

In the spring of 1959 dad and grandpa bought a small cabin located at a place on a slough off of the Mississippi river. It was a great place for fishing and after that I could use the boat to paddle around in. It was a weekend place to get away from town.

The winter of 1959/1960 was brutal, cold with lots of snow and rain all through the midwest. All of that started melting away as the weather warmed. It caused massive flooding all down the river. That included the cabin area. Dad and grandpa were anxious to find out if the cabin was okay. We drove up there, only to find the rock road to the cabin was flooded and water was too deep to drive through. That was on a Saturday. By Sunday dad had a plan; we would put grandpa’s little light weight, 8 foot long “John” boat on dad’s station wagon and find a place where we could put the boat in the water and get over to the cabin.

Dad called a man (named Mel) whose cabin was next to ours to see if he wanted to go along and he did. He also brought his 25 horsepower outboard motor to propel us from our launch point to the cabin.

The only place we could get to and launch the boat was several miles away. Not only that, but we would have to go out onto the Mississippi river and then enter the slough. The path to the launch point involved walking through several places that got our feet wet and cold, mistake number 1. We dragged the boat along with us until we reached the launch point.

Mistake number 2, we put the boat half way onto the water. Mel attached his outboard motor onto the transom at the back of the boat. He piled in with his 5 gallon gas tank and set it down on the boat beside the motor. This little 8 foot long boat was designed for 2 or 3 and a lightweight trolling motor, not a heavy outboard motor. Dad got in and sat beside Mel. Grandpa had the middle seat and I was to push the boat the rest of the way into the water and hop into the front seat. Mistake number 3, it appeared that I was the only one to see that this was too much weight for the small boat, but I was not going to tell dad he was wrong and this would not work. So I did as I was told and as the boat was pushed into the water, it went straight to the bottom of the water about 10 feet deep. I never got the chance to get into the boat. Big problem, grandpa could not swim, Mel came to the surface and swam out to the solid ground. Dad came up, but grandpa didn’t. Dad bobbed down and up searching for grandpa. Dad found him and pulled him to the surface and then out of the water. They were all shivering from the icy cold. Grandpa was so stiff he could barely move.

We trekked back toward the car, dad helping grandpa all the way, using a little help from a large bottle of whiskey dad kept pouring down grandpa along the way. We got to the car, dad fired up the big Chrysler station wagon, turned the heater up to full blast and we rushed for home, still pouring whiskey down grandpa’s throat. By the time we reached home grandpa was feeling no pain, taking giant steps and humming a tune. That was the only time grandpa ever got drunk. Mom’s Irish came out as she screamed at dad “What did you do to my father?” That was the only time dad ever backed down from anyone. Grandpa was put to bed and we had some hot food.

The next weekend, dad and I went back to find the boat. It was still icy cold. Dad had a grappling hook and a rope he kept tossing it into the area where the boat went down. After a half hour or more we were both cold. I had an idea to find the boat and get us home. I stripped down to my undershorts and all 100 pounds of me walked into the water, then started bobbing down to the bottom to find the boat. It didn’t take me long to find it and place the grappling hook so dad could pull the boat out, I was shivering as I put my clothes on, but there was no whiskey to warm me up with; although dad warmed himself up.

We never got to mistake number 4, going out into the Mississippi to get to the cabin. Had we gotten out onto the Mississippi, mistake number four would have been our deaths by drowning in the mighty, raging Mississippi. In ending this story, I’m thinking 3 wrongs did make 1 right.