The Washington herald., 1910-04-21
GLAD DAYS OF CHEAP FISH.
Recalled Where Price Has Gone Up
1000 Per Cent in thirty Years.

Recalled Where Price Has Gone Up
1000 Per Cent in thirty Years.
From the Bangor Daily News.
Down about the Bucksport weirs in the
old days. few OF the weir owners thought
Of asking money for fresh alewives or
rough-backed founders. When an honest
old farmer came in from the country and
wanted "a mess of fresh fish," he was
given a peck or a bushel Of alewives. or
a barrel OF firm founders. and a kindly
God bless you" 20 boot. and sent home
rejoicing with wholesome food enough 20
last his family for a week. Long since
the close Of the civil war one could buy a
twenty-pound salmon dipped all alive and
dripping from the weir pound for s. or
less. while at low tide IN the weirs at
Penobscot Narrows and Standpoint the
great ungainly and green Holsters went
crawling around on the floors OF the
barred pounds, actually sticking up their
ugly claws and asking the onlooker 20
pick them up and boil them and eat them.
Whatever alewives We're left overland
there were usually a busheI 10 FIVE or six
barrels at every tide-were washed clean
~ and put IN strong pickle for two or
three days. and then strung on cedar
sticks. ten 10 a stick. and hung aloft I'm
the roof Of the smOke-house. where they
remained for two weeks or more. until
thoroughly cured. after which they were
carried to Bucksport market, or sent 20
Boston. 20 he sold at about six or eight
cents a stick, TO be retalled 10 the ulti-
mate consumer later. on, for ono cent
smoked alewife. or ten cents a stick
Those were the glad days of cheap living
when a stranger. riding through a town
or village along Penobscot River Of
June evening. had his appetite whetted
and his nostrils regaled with the odors
of grilled alewives, and every kitchen
window was open, or had a screen in. to
let out the choking smoke from the holo-
caust
As remembered to-day. there was no
better supper for a workIngman than two
or three hot cream tartar biscuits and a
rat herring, smoked and roasted with the
thousands Of nutty spawns inside. and the
sweet and toothsome flesh showing redly
among the bones. Counting the cost Of a
/ hot biscuit al a cent. and a pat Of butter
l
could have a fine alewife. the three hot
biscuits. a cup OF tea and butter for
supper, all for five cents. which was what
might be called cheap cost OF lving-and
/ good enough for anybody.
/ Penobscot River alewives have not been
running in the river long enough this sea-
! son-or enough Of them have not come 70
/ get into the local stores. but last Thurs
/ day morning a dozen boxes of smoked
4 herrings from St John arrived at a mill
supply store in a Bangor suburb. and
though the herring is not so big a fish or
so fat a fish. or so toothsome a fish as
the alewife. the dealer was retailing the
St John "gaspereau" over the counter at
lten cents for every fish. II was some
F.! thing of a jump. was this OF one cent
for fat and edible smoked fish 70 ten
cents for lean smoked fish. that was
made edible by the amount Of salt which
II held, but the wives and daughters Of
the millmen laid down their dimes. ap-
parently as willing as their mothers used
10 fork over red pennies. although every
one Of them knew that the cost Of living
on smoked fish in Maine had increased by
1000 per cent within thirty years.