The Pacific Pearl Part I

by John Mickman

This story is the continuing saga of my first trip to Kodiak, Alaska were I became a commercial shrimp and crab fisherman in the early 1970's.

Combined with the 'pin money' I had earned painting the interior of the house my buddy Tony would eventually buy, and after working on the Western Girl, the Halibut Schooner that I had helped unload and overhaul their 'skates' of gear,  I had almost $500. A fortune; my money problems were over for the time being. That issue out of the way, I continued my quest of getting a job on a fish boat from one of the vessels that fished out of Kodiak, Alaska. It was 1972, I was 21 years old and life was good.

My buddy Tony and I got to be better friends and most days I would visit him on the deck of the Pacific Pearl, the boat he worked on. We would talk about fishing and I met many more fishermen; it helped immensely having Tony with me in the harbor. We became a fixture in the Kodiak during those weeks. The Pacific Pearl was a 64' shrimp trawler that was kinda beat up, but Tony was happy to have a job. However, until the shrimp strike was over, he was working on the boat for free, painting, mending nets, working in the engine room, etc. I was helping, and learning.

Unfortunately for the Shrimp Boat Fleet, there was a strike going on; the cannery’s and fishermen could not arrive at a price. The unified fishing canneries made a couple of offers to the fishermen in the Shrimp Association and although neither Tony nor I could vote, we attended each meeting to keep abreast of what was happening in these important negotiations. The Fishermen were asking 7 cents/pound for shrimp and the canneries were offering 3 1/2 cents per pound; they had been paying 2 cents during the previous season. Of course as the weeks went by, the canneries started coming up in their offers and the fishermen started coming down; everyone wanted to get to work.

At one of these meetings, the canneries offered 4 1/2 cents per pound and the consensus of the fishermen was that 'maybe we should just take it; we have boat payments to make'. Towards the end of this meeting, just before the vote was to be taken, one handsome, chiseled featured boat captain stood up, and with a booming voice, and great resolve he stated the case for waiting it out until we received at least 5 1/4 cents per pound. His oration was extremely convincing and as he talked I could see lots of nods and whispers agreeing with this well respected captain.

The vote was taken right after the captain stated his case and the 4 cent offer was voted down; the strike would continue. I commented to Tony that the captain that had swayed the room had delivered an amazing speech; he had taken control of the room of more than 100 independent men. "That's my dad, Harold Jones", Tony said. "Do you want to meet him?"

"Well sure Tony", I replied. "How come I've never met him before?"

Tony smiled back at me, "My dad runs a big dragger called The Tradewinds. She is a big, Herring Seiner type boat from down the coast off of California. They just arrived with the boat a few days ago", Tony explained.

"How come you're not going to go fishing with your dad?", I asked.

"He has a crew already that worked for a long time in Seattle getting the boat ready and he has a full crew with those guys. If one of them quits or gets hurt, either my brother Chris or I will probably get onboard", Tony replied. Brother Chris was down in Port Angeles, Washington working on a construction crew waiting for the strike to end before he came up to Kodiak. He and Tony were to be the crewmen on the Pacific Pearl.

We went over to meet Captain Harold Jones and were able to talk for couple of minutes, but he was in a gaggle of other skippers talking about the strike, so Tony and I wandered off. A few days later, a buzz went up through the shrimp fleet that the canneries were going to make better offer; everyone was heading up to the town hall to hear the offer and vote.

The president of the Shrimp Assoc. announced that the canneries were offering 5 1/4 cents; 5 cents for the fishermen and a 1/4 cent going the fund the new Shrimp Association. Once again, Harold stood up and said that he thought this was an acceptable offer. The president called for a vote and it was unanimous; the strike was over!

Immediately after the vote, the room cleared as all the fishermen headed to the harbor to leave for the fishing grounds. The race was on!

As Tony and I walked briskly toward the harbor I asked Tony what he thought I should do. "You have to get to your house, get your gear and get down to the harbor, right now", Tony exclaimed. "All these skippers are going to leave the harbor and head to the ice dock to take on ice on their way out to the fishing grounds. If any of their crewmen don't show up, anyone standing there is likely to get a job!"

"Holy Smokes, Tony", I said as I cut-off in the other direction to Paul's house. "I'll see you down there in 15 minutes!" I stopped the walking, and ran to the house, threw a bunch of clothes in my backpack and high-tailed it down to the harbor in my well-worn, used hip boots.

The scene at the harbor was bedlam, as the skippers and crewmen were making last minute provisioning to their boats. Fishermen were all over the dock, the boats, marine hardware stores, and the grocery stores were already making 'standing order' deliveries of groceries to the boats tied up in the harbor. This was exciting!!!

Of course I was wearing my hip boots and asked everyone I saw if they were looking for a deck-hand. A few replied with the question, "Maybe. Do you have any experience?" I didn't, and did not receive any job offers.

The Pacific Pearl was tied up on the last dock 'finger', about halfway down the dock, and when I got to her, Tony was standing on deck jumping up and down waving for me. "John, I called my brother Chris and he won't be up here until tomorrow. Dick the skipper wants to leave right now and he's out trying to find a second deckhand so we can go fishing. You need to wait on deck with me; if he can't find anyone I think he might take you!"

"Geez Tony, I can't believe it. Really?", I said.

"I don't know for sure, but the first boat to the Ice Dock gets loaded and out to the fishing grounds first. He might take you. I know he likes you, and if he can't find an experienced guy right away, I told him you'd be down here in a few minutes. We'll just have to wait and see", Tony explained.

I could hardly breathe I was so excited. Peering through all the boat riggings we finally spotted Dick, rapidly walking along the dock toward the Pacific Pearl.  Alone.

Next week in 'The Pacific Pearl' Part II, find out if Dick hired me as a crewman.

John Mickman