Memories of Chauncy: From His Daughters

How to Fall

Being a rather clumsy sort, I like to tell people that I’ve fallen into all the best trout streams in Pennsylvania and Michigan. Luckily, Dad taught us how to fall while holding a rod. Whenever he saw me slipping on a rock or tripping over a sunken log, he’d yell out, "Keep your tip up!" Down I’d go, thoroughly soaked except for my right arm, with rod held high above the drink.

--Claudia

One More Cast

One of two running jokes in our family was the many times Dad almost drove off the road while looking for rises as we crossed over a bridge or drove along a road next to a stream. The other joke is the many, many times we’ve heard Dad say, "One more cast!", as we prepared to go home from a fishing trip. We’d be ready to go and Dad would say "One more cast." Five minutes later: "One more cast." Five minutes later: the same. My daughter Lizzie who inherited the fishing bug from her "Pop Pop," has also inherited the "One more cast" syndrome.

--Claudia

Liz and "Pop Pop"

As he had done with Anne and me, Dad taught Lizzie to cast, using hula hoops and also with a game he called "Cast Away." Lizzie caught her first fish, a rock bass, on a fly rod when she was four and "Pop Pop" couldn’t have been prouder. Now, at age twelve, fishing remains her favorite activity. Last summer, while we were visiting Dad in Michigan, she asked, "Pop Pop, are there any trout in front of your house besides little brookies?"

Dad replied that indeed there were some big browns there but they mostly fed after dark. After dinner, as he and Lizzie put on their waders and prepared to fish in front of the house, Lizzie asked if Pop Pop had a flashlight she could borrow. "Why do you need a flashlight?" he asked. "Well," said Lizzie, "I might want to fish after dark." Dad shook his head and chuckled, "I don’t think so, Liz!"

Dad was proud of the love of fishing he had instilled in his granddaughter.

--Claudia

Texas Shrimp

Dad and his buddy Jim Sheaffer heard about a lake with some really good fishing not too far from the Army base. The big Texas bass in this lake, so they were told, were especially fond of shrimp.

On their very next leave they set out, with a newly purchased bag of shrimp in hand for a USO near the lake. Their plan was to stay overnight there and get an early start the next morning. When they arrived, Dad and Shafe checked their equipment in one of the lockers and went upstairs to bed. The next morning when they came down to the lobby there was a horrible odor permeating the place. Too late, they realized that in a hot climate one should never store shrimp in a locker! Dad and Shafe sheepishly retrieved their equipment and slinked away.

Never ones to waste perfectly good bait, however, Jim Sheaffer held the bag at arm’s length out the bus window during the final leg of the trip to the lake.

We never did hear how the Texas bass liked those shrimp.

--Anne

Fishing by Bus

It wasn’t until 1952 that Mom and Dad got their first car: a robin’s egg blue Plymouth. But lack of a car was no detriment to these two avid fishermen. They’d catch the early morning Green Tree bus to Pittsburgh and then from there take a bus to Bellefonte in central Pennsylvania. They’d spend the weekend fishing Spring Creek until it was time to catch the bus back to Pittsburgh.

--Anne

Lawn Fishing

Mom and Dad taught us to fish when we were still pretty little. We’d go out to the back yard on summer evenings after dinner and we’d practice laying down a fly in the middle of a hula hoop placed on the grass. You can imagine what the neighbors thought . . . Well, years later, a friend on our street confided that the neighbors assumed we were a family that loved fly fishing so much that we did it even when there was not a drop of water near!

--Anne

"Rise and Shine"

"Rise and Shine" Dad would call cheerily at 4:30 or 5:00 A. M. on weekend mornings, and come into our room all dressed for fishing. Claudi and I would roll over and grumble sleepily into our pillows. Dad was always disgustingly cheerful early in the morning.

--Anne

A Page From Chauncy’s Diary

May 14, 1949
Marion, Aikey*, Self
Loyalhanna Creek above Ligonier

Started the day with a bang when we discovered in Ligonier that we left our lunch in Pittsburgh.

Stream very low and clear but looked good. Marion and I fished upstream with dry and nymph while Aikey fished downstream.

I was plagued with big shiners but Marion switched to a nymph and proceeded to catch a smallmouth and an eight-inch brown at the tail of the long pool above the swimming hole -- her first trout! Quite an accomplishment as this part of the stream isn’t stocked. Both of Marion’s boots leaked but she kept at it like a veteran. I’ll never live down her skunking me.

* Aikey is Marion’s brother and was their long-time fishing companion, George Aiken. RWOL

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