Genesis of Father's Carp net-fishing at Barrytown

For those who don’t know the genesis of the carp net fishing in the lagoon, this is how I remember it: Father was fishing on the bank of the Hudson River with a few of us in early 1977, when Takashige Sakezono (member of my class of ’77) came rushing up to Father with a large brown carp wrapped in a volleyball or tennis net.

He told Father where he got it, and Father was off like a shot in that direction. Within a couple of hours, several of us — maybe 20 or so — were knee deep, shoulder to shoulder, holding a volleyball or tennis net in a line several yards wide at the opening of this small finger of the lagoon (closest to the trail) — and we walked the netting forward step by step toward the end of that fingerling, perhaps only 40-50 feet, and carp of all colors were being forced into the shallows — churning like crazy. It was a sight to see!

We tossed them onto the land and they were flopping all over the place. Father was all lit up.

That was the start. Father then bought the netting and strong string, and we began a nightly job of net building with him — first in the 1st floor lecture hall, and then later out on the soccer field. Eventually, we fished the entire lagoon, strategically placing the nets at high tide around the 3 bridges — carp had no where to go except into our nets.

In addition, we caught eels with hooks and bait. We tried to eat some of the carp and eels, but when we cut them open, they smelled like gasoline — pollution from the Hudson. Some of us cooked a few

anyway — the small ones — with a stick in their mouths over a campfire and ate them. The fire cooked the gas out. Great times and memories.