Local history: Years ago, Indian River was paradise for adventurous Fort Pierce boys
Early Fort Pierce residents referred to the Indian River Lagoon as the Indian River or just The River. For three young men growing up on The River from the 1920s through the Depression and war years, life was a wonderful adventure on a rich and pristine waterway.
J.C. Monroe was born July 23, 1918. From age 3 until the 1926 Hurricane destroyed it, J.C. lived in a houseboat on the west shore of the Indian River between Taylor Creek and Moore’s Creek, with his mother and three brothers.
After school when commercial fishing boats caught huge catches of mackerel, J.C. would gut fish at Peterson’s fish house dock over the Indian River, often until dark. He said it seemed like the fish house was “plumb full of fish.”
J.C. says he was a good swimmer. After about age 5, he and his pals would swim and “cut the fool” in Taylor Creek. He said back then the water in Taylor Creek was clear and clean and had a white sandy bottom. He said that today it is full of fertilizers from upstream and the bottom of Taylor Creek is thick layers of mud.
On the other hand, Moore’s creek back then was filled with “raw sewage and gunk … they had three big sewer pipes along with Moore’s Creek delivering raw sewage from Fort Pierce neighborhoods into the Indian River.”
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With a small drag net J.C. and his brother started their first bait business. Once they each made a few dollars, they’d go to the “show” and buy candy and sodas and forget about the bait business.
All of the boys had small sailing skiffs called “moths.” They’d catch all sorts of fish, clams and oysters and what they didn’t eat they would sell to Peterson’s fish house. J.C. remembered skipping school one day and sailing his skiff down the Indian River to Mud Creek. The wind dropped out and he didn’t get home till 9 at night. He said, “I really got a whoppin’ that day. Whoo! I got a good one.”
J.C. used to catch 20 or 30 trout in the river at a time trolling pork rinds on a hook. He used two hand lines off the corners of his moth sailboat. He mostly sold them to Peterson’s Fish house. His friends, Todd Backus, “Beanie” Backus (the renowned Florida landscape artist),
George Backus and Harry Hill (An early Fort Pierce photographer) all had sailing skiffs and on Sundays they’d race them up and down the Indian River.
J.C. Monroe enlisted and served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific during WWII. After the war he spent his life as a commercial fisherman. He said, “It was a great life and I loved it.”
Johnny Jones, another commercial fishing legend, was born Aug. 17, 1927, in St. Lucie, a village north of Fort Pierce, on land that his great- great- grandfather, Major James Paine had settled.
Johnny said, “The Indian River was one of the first things we learned” and he was lucky to grow up in such a wonderful place. Johnny’s grandfather made canvas shoes for all of the kids for wading to protect their feet from stingrays and oysters. He learned to make, mend and use nets. He once caught so many mullet in a cast net off a dock that he had to tie it off and run to get his grandfather to help him pull the net in.
Johnny used to harvest diamondback terrapins with his grandfather and put them in a pen at their dock until they had enough to ship north for terrapin soup. He would catch and crush blue crabs to feed the turtles. They’d catch loggerhead turtles for food.
“Back then nobody had motors, not the normal people in Fort Pierce.” They rowed or sailed their skiffs. For turtles they used large mesh gill nets. They’d row up the river with an incoming tide and watch for turtles to sound. They would time it so they could ride the outgoing tide back home.
Once they saw a turtle come up for air and were sure of its direction, they’d row fast around the front of it and circle the net. “They’ll be in that circle but do not always get caught in the net right away… you see the corks bumpin’ as they go along it, but eventually their flippers would get caught in the net.” If his grandfather said they were going to get three turtles that day that was it. His grandfather always said, “We’ll leave that turtle for next time.” Johnny called this “conservationism.”
There used to be a lot more manatees because “there were no motor boats to hit them” and the sea grass, their main food, was abundant. They would only kill one manatee at a time. It would provide meat for their family and neighbors. This was during the Depression. They used a harpoon to kill sea cows. Nothing was wasted.
They wasted nothing including water for the garden. They would cut the top and bottom out of a 55-gallon drum and dig it into the ground. The water would come up into the drum, because the water level is only a few feet below the surface near the river. They would then dip buckets of water for the garden.
Johnny said they used to catch lots of sea trout in the Indian River.
“Way back, we used to just troll on our sailing boats. Later we put in Briggs and Stratton motors. As the time went on, we trolled trout here in the river using five cane polls rigged in a fan shape. First they used line with a feather. When a fish hit you’d fold the pole over and grab the line and pull it in. Sometimes you’d have five on at one time.” He said as time went on, there was a lot more traffic and speedboats on the river and it was harder to catch a trout.
Johnny also had a little canvas skiff that he rowed everywhere in the river. Johnny and his grandfather hunted and fished from this skiff in the Indian River and in the Savannas. They would hunt and fish in the fresh water estuaries all the way to Jensen Beach. They would bring home fresh fish and ducks.
Johnny said growing up on the Indian River was “just wonderful”. After serving in the Merchant Marine and making many trips across the U-boat infested North Atlantic during WWII, Johnny Jones carpentered and commercial king fished out of Fort Pierce for the rest of his days.
Tommy Taylor, born July 1, 1927, was a marine mechanic. He lived on 12th Street in Fort Pierce, but hung out at Peterson’s dock with his best friend Gene Hayes, son of early Fort Pierce commercial fishing legend Terrell “Pappy” Hayes. He said that G.T. Backus of Backus Boat works built bantam sailboats for the local boys. They kept them at Peterson’s dock. They were about 10 feet long and had flat bottoms and a centerboard. Like J.C. Monroe a decade earlier, they raced them on the river on Sundays.
This was during wartime and the Navy had taken over the beaches and did not allow civilians east of the channel. Taylor said for mischief they would sail their little boats into the shallow grass flats on the east side of the river with their centerboards up. The sailors would chase them and run aground. The boys would sail by the grounded sailors and laugh. One day the sailors had an airboat and caught the boys. They said the reason they weren’t allowed there was because the Navy was setting off explosions in the area. Tommy said they felt bad and never pulled that prank again.
Once, Tommy and his friend Freddy Ray were sailing in the Indian River several miles south of Fort Pierce. They headed into the shallow grass flats and failed to pull up the centerboard which hit bottom and tore out the hull. It sank and they swam and waded to the shore where the Navy was practicing mock invasions. A fellow manning a machine gun nest said, “Where the hell did you boys come from?”
Then an officer sent a Jeep to take the boys to the Navy entrance gate at the south bridge and turned them loose. They walked to the Arcade Building in downtown Fort Pierce where Tommy’s older brother had a soda shop. Their families were all there crying. They had found their sunken boat and believed the boys had drowned.
Tommy Taylor served in the Air National Guard and later won the Florida Distinguished Service Medal for heroic rescues during the 1949 Hurricane.
All of these early river denizens appreciated the bountiful Indian River. Sadly, the crystal clear sandy bottom of Taylor Creek is long gone. Today the manatees and sea grasses in the lagoon are dying at alarming rates. But for these early young men, the river was a glorious paradise.
This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: The Indian River was a paradise for adventurous Fort Pierce boys
