STORY PAGE
Switching Motors
While my dad and grandfather were home working, often my
grandmother and my sister and I would stay at camp. (Sandy Pond)
During my teen years I would, on occasion, stay at camp without adult
supervision if my grandmother stayed home to take care of the rest of the
family. I had my aluminum Arkansas Traveler with my 7 ½ HP Elgin outboard and
could get were ever I wished to go. (If you could get there by water, ) I had friends who were permanent residents
and there were always other neighbors around if I needed an adults help. Well,
almost always.
One such week my cousin and her girlfriend were allowed to stay with me. Yes, my cousin’s girlfriend was cute. Yes, we were attracted
to each other. No, that is not the story.
I removed my 7 ½ HP Elgin and replaced it with my grandfather’s 18 HP Evinrude. (Something I had been told not to do.) Actually the 7
½ was too powerful for my boat until we had attached center steering and placed the driving position forward and at the bottom of the boat. The 18 Evinrude
with tiller steering was a disaster waiting to happen. It did however get the three of us to the beach and back in no time.
One afternoon after returning from the beach, I dropped the girls at the dock, and commenced to show them how proficient I was with boat
and motor. I would head directly for the dock and turn at the last moment. They loved it. I would turn and set the boat up on its side while I was balanced
on the other side. Then, I hit my own wake, was thrown clear and the boat started to circle. It wouldn’t have happened with the 7 ½. Even if I had managed
to get thrown clear, the throttle would have shut off, and the boat stopped. The 18 had a tiller throttle. It wasn’t going very fast, but it had a
six-gallon tank of gas and the circles were getting larger. Soon it would hit something or head for the other side of the lake.
I had to get close enough to grab the tiller or the gas
line. I prepared. I was too close. The
boat hit me in the head driving me under. My knee hit the bottom hard. I got
back up head woozy, knee sore. I tried again. I caught and disconnected the gas
line. It soon ran out of carburetor gas and came to a stop. I grab the line in
front and walked to the dock and the laughing ladies. The red on my face was not
sunburn.
The girls stopped laughing they pointed. The red they
indicated was in the water. It was coming from my knee. My knee was numb. It had
a deep gash across the side and one in the front. The prop had cut me. It
apparently was not deep enough to hit the bone or sever anything, but it was
bleeding fairly well. We had no phone, no neighbors were around, and the girls
could not drive the boat. I needed attention soon.
I tried numerous bandages to close the wound. No luck. I asked the girls to try stitching it while it was numb. They couldn‘t even try. They did find a needle and some thin fishing line. I managed a few awkward stitches and poured peroxide over the wound. The girls then cut one of my clean t-shirts and we covered the wound. I swore the girls to secrecy. For the next few days they fussed over me like a pair of mother hens.
Before my grandparents arrived, the numbness had gone away. It was replaced by throbbing pain, but I could walk. Aspirins helped a
little. I knew I was in trouble. The trouble was not the wound. The trouble was my grandfather. The girls had managed to get the boat up on the ramp far
enough to tie it, but they could not lift the heavy motor from the boat. I would catch Hell. He didn’t say a word to me. In less than a week, the 18 horse
was replaced by a 6 horse.
With the help of a friend I managed to remove the stitches. To my knowledge, my grandfather never knew about my knee or what happened.
Quite a few years later I told my grandmother. She herself didn’t believe me until she saw the scars. I saw my
cousin again shortly after she graduated high school. (She told me her good looking friend was becoming a nun). I
have not heard from either in over 45 years.
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