More from Burnett Inlet Hacthery

When we were at Burnett Inlet living on the sail boat Kay was 3 and 4 and Christy 7 and 8. We had the CAAJACK, our sail boat tied on the inside of the hatcheries big float. Our boat was named CAAJACK because that was the first initial of each of our children in order of age: Cheryl, Asha, Anu, Jenny, Andy, Christy, and Kay. We had a ramp up to the bottom of the two stair wooden ladder that hung over the side of the boat. One Sunday afternoon we were all on the boat and Kay and Christy wanted to go out on the float. They loved to play there. Kay used to lay on the side of the float with her head and shoulders over the side and she fished stuff out of the water with her hands. One day she had several little clear jelly fish on the float beside her. If it floated buy she had it. Sometimes she had long pieces of kelp. And Christy had her fish pole and caught lots of fish from that float. I kept wondering if she was going to hook up a big halibut. She didn’t but she sure could have.

The hatchery manager’s son, Jason, was a year older than Christy so he spent a lot of time on the float too. He and Christy caught lots of sand sharks. They are about 2 to 3 feet long and had a really sharp set of teeth. The kids had been warned about them and never had an accident with them but they sure caught and killed a lot of them. Christy would haul one in and Jason would take it off the hook and he liked to stab them.

Anyway, this one Sunday afternoon the girls want out of the boat and on the float. They always had to put on their lifejackets anytime they got out of the inside of the boat. Christy climbed off the boat first and Kay was following. She didn’t turn around to go down the stairs backwards that time. Instead she went down facing out and slipped. She fell down between the boat and the ramp and landed in the water. We heard a splash and a scream so we both piled up and out of the boat. When Kay went down the edge of that ramp caught her right under the nose. She was in the water when I got there. I pulled her out and couldn’t believe what she looked like. It was absolutely heart breaking to see this beautiful little girl with her nose pushed half way to her left eye. Her whole nose was a half inch off center and ¼ to ½ inch higher than it was supposed to. Thank God she had her lifejacket on.

Sue brought up a towel and we got Kay dried off and we went up to the hatchery bunkhouse. We were going to call Ketchikan for a charter plane to come get us for a doctor, but Tod’s oldest son and his fiancé were there. When someone heard our story they told us that Tod’s son’s fiancé was a doctor. We called her and she examined Kay and with her fingers she pushed the nose around and decided that it wasn’t broken. Her upper lip was swollen way up with all black inside. And after that gal manipulated her nose a bit it was much straighter. She didn’t think that the doctor in town would be able to do anything more for Kay so we didn’t go. I remember saying that Kay didn’t even look like herself. Kay must have heard that said more than once. After about three days I remember her coming to me with tears asking, “Dad, when am I going to look like me again?” It was absolutely amazing to see how fast she healed up. Within 10 days you couldn’t tell that anything had happened.

We had lots of Chum and Pink salmon swimming around in the bay. That hatchery produced 40 million eggs of each type. The returning adults mill around the mouth of the creek for several days before starting up. During that time for about an acre of salt water around the mouth of the creek it just gets black with fish. It was fun to take a fish pole and catch some. Christy liked to go with dad and one day the two of us were in my little 12’ skiff fishing when I saw this pink salmon jumping across the water right at us. He kept coming and jumped right over the side of the boat and landed on my seat. I always sat sideways on the seat for running the outboard and that is how I was then, With one leg in front and the other behind the seat. The fish slid on that seat and hit me right in the you know whats. Then he fell in the back of the boat and splashed water all over me. I reached down and grabbed him just ahead of the tail and said, “I’m not ready for you yet!” as I threw him back in the water. Christy really laughed and over the years since we have looked at each other with a knowing look anytime someone says, “They were so thick they were jumping in the boat!” We really had that happen!

That sail boat we lived on had a ferro-cement hull. That is very solid stuff up to a point. The boat weighed 35 tons. The girls had their own stateroom amidships. Our stateroom was in the stern. We could talk back and fourth if we spoke up. But towards the middle of the run when there were lots of fish milling around we could actually hear fish swimming into, and hitting the boat hull. It took a while before we realized what it was that we were hearing. When we would hear one or two someone would say, “There goes another flat nosed fish!” I don’t remember who came up with that we all sure laughed. Sometimes we would hear a whole school hit the boat. We could even feel the boat move when a bunch of them hit and spooked and turned all at once. They would actually make that 35 ton boat rock a little. Then someone would say, “There is a whole school of flatnoses!”