Maggie's Farm

In high school I had the opportunity to work as crew on a fishing boat out of Chatham (south coast of Cape Cod, Wellfleet is on the North Coast). Captain John was the owner and I just realized I can't remember the name of the boat (forty-five years). Captain John was a weir fisherman, each season he would plant poles in the bottom and hang his nets. The weir would be in the shape of a P, the bottom pointed to the beach and the purse had a net with a narrow opening that pointed at the beach. The schools of fish ran along the coast and when they hit the net would follow it until they entered the net at the narrow opening.
I got on the boat and got busy picking up the trash off the deck. Captain John never spoke at less than a roar, sometimes a bellow. He would keep you hopping. When we got to the net the Captain would position the boat over the opening to the net. Then all hands would head to the rail and start hauling net. A circle of net forty or fifty yards across would be hauled in by hand by ten or twelve men (and a boy). As the purse became smaller, the water boiled with the thrashing of the captured fish. Men with large nets on the ends of long poles would start dipping into the purse and hauling out the fish. They would spill the contents of the net into the bare deck and other men armed with gill hooks would start separating the catch into different bins. After the last fish were brought on board the least important man would be tasked with cleaning the deck and stowing the gear (me). A fast run back to the dock and then we would hump the heavy bins full of fish up the dock to the packing shed.
I loved it. Some of the best days of my life.
Years later I heard that when Captain John (Italian last name) retired, his sons sold the boat and the dock and used the money to get started in the sewage pumping business on Cape Cod. They undoubtedly made the right business decision. But a part of my youth died.