Father’s Day and Fishing

By Chris Erwin

When I think about fishing, my dad often comes to mind. So taking him fishing on Father’s Day is sort of a no-brainer for me. Most kids grow up passing baseball or shooting hoops in the driveway with their dad, but that wasn’t the case for me.

My dad worked for the railroad for 36 years and six months, and he painted houses on the weekends for much of my young life while my mom managed Daniels Home Bakery.  They both loved us kids, but there was little time for playing around in the yard. When they did manage to get off work together and take their vacation time, they piled my brother, sister and me up in the family station wagon and headed for Dale Hollow Lake.

This was a special time for my family, a time when we could all be together and do something we all loved. As kids, I can remember lying like cord wood in the back of the station wagon, all three of us covered with a blanket trying to sleep away the trip and just open our eyes as we passed Lake Cumberland, heading on toward Albany Kentucky and on down the six mile road from Albany to Adams Camp, later to be called Wolf River Dock.

There we would camp and stay in the cabins; it was like being in a different world. We made friends with locals and visitors over the years. As the years passed, we all became an extended family planning parties and fishing outings together.

Most of all, this was a time that I could be one-on-one with my father. It was a time to make up for all the missed chances when we could do things together, but work was always in the way.

My dad really likes to night fish, and Dale Hollow at that time was teaming with white bass and crappie. That was and is the fishing, he loves the best. We would sit on a pontoon boat at night fishing with live bait, mantle lanterns lighting up the water along the edge of the boat and shad circling the lit area, as we dropped our minnows down through them.

We really made a party of it, renting a pontoon that at one time was a houseboat. The story was it caught on fire and the dock owners just converted it to a big pontoon boat.  It was like 45 feet long so we all fit on it, and we all fished from it. Those nights have burned into my very fabric, and it’s the most precious time I can remember with my dad.

My dad is 92 now. He gets around good and still loves to fish. While he doesn’t make it all night much anymore, we go out at night and fish for a few hours and usually talk about those years when we all went to Dale.  It transforms me back into that kid again, and the years seem to melt away even if it’s only for a short time. We still pop popcorn on the pontoon boat, and I can almost hear my mother’s voice again. She has been gone now for 15 years, but her voice would carry over the water like she was on a microphone telling us kids the popcorn and hot chocolate were ready. So I hope to be taking my dad fishing father’s day and maybe recapture a little of the past.

This is your time, use it to connect to your dad if he is still alive, or to remember your dad if he’s gone. Don’t waste it. Make a memory and take your dad fishing!