Thread: The beginning

My dad started me fishing, but not just any type of fishing it was crappie fishing. This would be in the 50's, and on Santee. We would go to stumphole and fish with minnows, we caught lots of crappie back then. We started jig fishing in the 60's, and also caught lots of crappie. This would be the main reason that I still love crappie fishing. I think that as we see people write their start of fishing, someone in their family started them fishing. I know its hard for us older kids to take the youger kids fishing, but their are many lasting memories for the kids old and new, with this said TAKE A KID FISHING.

My start would have been in the late 60's also. Dad didn't fish any fresh water only salt but there was a older couple that lived 2 houses from us. He asked my dad if I could stay the night with them and go fishing the next morning and dad agreed. This couple didn't have any children and that night I was treated like I was the only kid in the world! The next morning before daylight we were baiting rods with mullet and setting on the bank of the Saluda River. My first trip of a life long love for the river that I still fish. We caught a lot of fish that day and I learned to respect what a catfish can do to your hands but my love for fishing was born that day.

This couple became my adopted grandparents, they have been gone for many years now but I think of them often while on the water. Like the movie, in my heart a River Runs Through It.

I'm going to make this thread a sticky for awhile as I think we will read some very interesting post. Thanks Tim for starting it.

I wished I could say how or when I started fishing. I can remember trying to catch a fish while camping when I was very young but mostly all I can remember is I've fished all my life. I was born in '56. Back in my day of growing up us children in the neighborhood were turned loose everyday (and the screen door was locked when we went outside HA!) and all we had to do was make it in the house at 12 Noon for lunch and at 6PM for supper and in for the night by dark. If you were late for meals you didnt eat. Life was much simplier back in those days. Kids didnt get kidnapped nor was anybody doing drugs. Me and my neighborhood buddies spent every day at the creek fishing and swimming. We dug and sold worms for a dime a cup to the grown folks that came to fish and afterwards we headed to the neighborhood store with our monies for candy and ice cream. We fished with anything from set hooks to reed canes to our own rod and reels. Mostly our catches would be bream, cats, and the ocassional carp. Usually we'd tie our rods to a stump or a bush with a stringer while we swam in the running creek behind the backed up waters. Every once in awhile one of the neighbor's Dad would carry us to a catfish pond. Man, what a treat that was. Fishing has always been a BIG part of me for as long as I can remember. I was told my Grandpa LOVED fishing and was pretty good at it too. I never knew him as he died when I was just a baby but I'm guessing my love for fishing came thru him as an inheritance. And, as a bonus, my son took to fishing like a fish takes to water. I started him when he was 2 or 3 years old and he hasnt tired from it one little bit, and he's 33 yrs old now.

Got my start very early. My mama worked 2nd shift in a cotton mill. Pop was on 1st. So when he came home he would load up the old car we had and me and head out to the carp ponds. His uncle ran one so we was regular customers. Now I was about a year or so old I am told when we would go fishin. He had a wooden box to keep me in so I wouldnt get in the way or fall in. Had my bottle and a toy to keep me quite. As I got older I got to get out of the box. Then I finally got to fish. Well anyway I would throw my line out. Then drag it in about 2 minutes later. But I was fishin. The first time I actually remember fishin was at a carp pond in Gaffeny. Thinkin bout 5 or 6 at the time. Grandpa had got me one of the new spinning reels for my birthday. Made me a rod stand out of a forked tree limb. Had some real carp bait on it. Chunked it out and put it on the stand. Wasnt long and I had a bite. Pop kept saying let him take it before you jerk. Well he took it. Pulled it right out of my rodholder and splash. My new rig was gone. I think I cried for a week after that. But soon as I got the chance I was back after em. Been chasin scaley critters for a while now. Gave up deer huntin cause you cant throw em back after you shoot em and decide you dont want it. Love to take folks that have little or no fishin experience .Nothin better than seein em light up when they get that big one . Specially the kids. Guess thats cause my bride says I am still an old kid. Who cares. Long as it is fun and aint hurtin nobody.

first time I remember going fishin was around 1955 or 56 somewhere around there I was riding the bus home from school and saw my dads car at Taylor Greens cat fish and carp pond so I took a real good chance at getting a good blistering and got off the bus at the store and walked down to the pond where my dad scolded me a little and then got me a pole and made me sit down and fish till he got ready to go home -- cant remember if I caught a fish or not but I did set there and fished. my dad died when I was 13 and a man that owned a farm close by sort of took me under his wing and gave me a little money for cutting his grass and he had two ponds on his farm so after a while he bought me a rod and reel on conditions I pay him back -- it took a couple summers to do it but I did -- he also bought me two shisters one black and a yellow one that week I sneaked in a pond 2 miles away and caught a few small fish and then wham-ooo a 5lb bass liked to scared me to death but I got him in -- that ended my day fishin so I headed home with my catch == has anybody tried carrying 6-7 lb. of fish on one them nylon fish stringers 2 miles on a dead run at 14 years old? mama was proud of me because we had something to eat besides pinto beans and taters and that's how I got started fishin. and I still love to go fishin --any way any how any kind don't matter if I catch any or not I just love to go

I just always liked fishing. Far back as I can remember.

I don't remember the first time or a particular year...but, by the time I was old enough to have the interest, my dad & grandpa had quit crappie fishing. Dad was strictly a canepole/live bait fisherman and I guess I got the crappie addiction from him & grandpa...however, it was not my first love. I was mesmerized by running water and nothing suited me better than being on the Saluda river shin deep standing on the shoals and catching thousands of bream, catfish, carp, smallmouth, largemouth and any other creature that bit my hook. In the summer, dad would take me to fish the Nantahala or the Little Pigeon river or even Douglas Lake. When I was about 11 or 12, my uncle taught me how to cast a fly rod and after hearing his tales of adventure and wonder...another monster was created. I knocked the paint off every red/white popping bug that I got my hands on. Nothing matched the excitement of a bull gill exploding on topwater to inhale my bug....Very fond memories were made wading the banks of those rivers and many valuable lessons learned...nothing like a wood infested river with thousands of overhanging limbs to teach a young lad how to cast and tie knots. As I grew older the lure of big water seemed to be a natural progression...I bought my first boat, a 60's model aluminum v-hull with a 50's model 18hp Evindrude....that thing skipped like a kid playing hop-scotch. But I started terrorizing the lakes and fish that inhabited them. I thought I was Virgil Ward & Roland Martin all at the same time....lol. Life has a way of circling back though...kinda like beagles running rabbits. Although I can't count the number of fish that have come over the sides of the old boats I've owned...fish that I dreamed about as a boy...the faint call of the river is beginning to grow louder. And in my heart, I know that I must return...