My dad, Farrel Dablemont
My Dad’s birthday was this week. He died at the age of 84 in 2011. I miss him most when I am on the river, where we spent so much time together. Dad was several inches taller than me at 6’ 3”. He was strong and quiet, hard working and dedicated to his church and community. He was too young to fight in World War II, but when he was just barely 17 he joined the merchant marines and wound up on the high seas in liberty ships, which took a tremendous beating during the war. High numbers of them were sunk by German U-boats, and thousands of merchant marine sailors were lost at sea.
Actually, it was my dad who taught me to fish and run the river when I was just a little tyke. I was floating the river with Dad when I was only 6 or 7, learning how to cast an old open-faced Shakespeare casting reel.
One of my best selling books is an account of my dad’s experiences he was just a kid on the Piney I the 1930’s. It is entitled “Little Home on the Piney”. If you would like a copy, contact me.
The following is just part of a magazine article he wrote years ago and it is his memories of long ago days on the river….
----What fishing there was in those days! The Big Piney River was full of bass and goggle-eye and black perch. It was nothing to catch 30 or 40 perch and goggle-eye in a single day, and a dozen or so nice smallmouth bass.
I missed a lot of school in the spring and fall so I could guide fishermen, but it couldn’t be helped, the family needed the money. I made good grades because I studied hard and read a lot. The schools understood in those days when boys were needed at home.
My customers were mostly nice people and I enjoyed working for them. I had one man who insisted on standing on the front seat to fish. I warned him if we hit a submerged rock or stump he would fall out. He told me he was a gymnast and an expert on balance. So being a dumb kid like I was, I decided to see how good he was. Going down a deep riffle, I saw a small stump just underwater and I built up a little steam and hit it head on. I can’t describe how he looked flailing in mid-air with both arms and legs while he fought to keep his feet on that boat seat. But he wasn’t the expert on balance he declared himself to be. He went in with a big splash. For some reason he never used my guiding services again, even though he caught a good mess of fish that day after he dried out.
Then there was a man from St. Louis who wanted to photograph the Big Piney River. He was to come early on a Saturday morning but on Friday we had a heavy rain. He showed up the next morning with his wife and sister-in-law after the river had risen 15 feet. I told him I was sorry but it was just too high to float.
“I thought you were a riverman?” he said. “I just want to take pictures. Couldn’t we make it?”
So the four of us set out in a 16-foot wooden johnboat. I knew the river and all the dangerous bluffs and crooked places. So when the river was straight I stayed in the middle and in the main current, and where it was crooked I took to the edges and paddled through the fields where the water wasn’t as fast. Boy, what a ride we had! There were some tense moments when my passengers were hanging on for dear life, but we made it in four hours…a distance of 20 miles. We even stopped twice to climb hills and take pictures.
The gentleman paid me well but now that I’m older and wiser, I would never do it again, and shouldn’t have done it then. We were all risking our lives.
As a fishing guide I have seen strange things on river floats. I took two lawyers from Springfield on a few trips. I remember one trip in particular when they had done well in the morning but by noon they had downed most of a whole bottle of Jim Beam. One threw a wild lure and caught the other one in the lobe of his ear. I’m not much of a surgeon but I offered to cut the hooks and take it out. The fisherman declined. He wore that lure in his ear for the rest of the trip, taking a drink of his antiseptic every so often. After that, I asked that fishermen take no alcohol on float trips. It was one of the smartest moves I ever made.
I have seen grown men cry when they lost a big fish. One got so mad he broke his rod over his knee and threw it in the river.
I am so than thankful l that I lived the life I had as a kid, in a time when the rivers were clean and clear and God gave me the privilege of watching so many people catch fish while floating through those beautiful unmarred hills and valleys, which were then still much as He created them. And I’m thankful he let me be a part of a vanishing breed…an Ozark riverman. Only those of us who remember it the way it was then, know how bad it is now…and what God-given treasures we have lost forever.