1950s - Hornpout

My mother, grandfather and father

My family was instrumental in my interest in fishing.  My father taught me how to fish and when my grandfather came to visit he would often say "Go get your fishing pole" and I would run to the garage and grab one of our long bamboo poles and go fishing while my grandfather watched me catch sunfish or perch.  Since we were Catholic, we had to eat fish on Fridays, so of course we liked to eat the fish that we caught --and my poor mother had to clean and cook them.  The fish we caught frequently were hornpout and here is a picture of a very large one that my father caught.

Hornpout

With hornpout, you have to be careful picking them up to avoid getting stabbed with one of the spikes in their fins.  My mother had a unique way of dealing with these spikes when she was cleaned the fish - she pinned the hornpout to a cutting board with an ice pick right through the fish's head!  She then filleted the fish without getting stabbed.