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"Catch of the Day"
by Henry Atwater
(Our State magazine, August 1999.
Reprinted with permission of the publisher.)

Catch of the Day

For two boys at summer camp in 1950, a clandestine nighttime fish hunt at Bogue Sound captures more than a panful of flounder as a writer remembers the bond of friendship and the lure of breaking the rules.

It's the summer of 1950 at Camp Morehead on North Carolina's Bogue Sound. Campers and counselors take their seats for supper in the dining hall. Servers bring out their trays, holding dishes of identical meals -- a meat patty, boiled potatoes, and string beans. Except for two campers, everyone receives this nutritious, but rather ordinary meal. A camper at my table asks why Tommy Moore and I aren't getting any supper.

Before I answer, a server strolls through the dining hall carrying two dishes, each containing a large, golden, breaded flounder in place of the meat patty. The servers ceremoniously place the flounder plates in front of Tommy and me -- much to the bewilderment of the other campers.

The question now becomes, "What did you guys do to deserve flounder for supper?" Tommy and I never reveal how our midnight fishing adventures led to this special meal.

Campers normally received fish only after having been on a chartered deep-sea fishing trip, arranged once or twice a season by camp director Cap'n Pat Crawford. Thirty or 40 campers would leave from Morehead City on two large boats, spend the day fishing, and return to camp with the day's catch for the kitchen staff to prepare the next evening.Tommy and I didn't depend on the traditional deep-sea fishing trip for our seafood dinner. Tommy's fine athletic ability had indirectly led us to participate in an unauthorized midnight flounder gigging -- definitely not on Cap'n Pat's list of approved camp activities.

Young fishermen display their day's loot; only two boys know of the bounty that awaits after midnight ... and they're not telling.
[ Henry is on the right with the striped shirt and glasses ]

Playing with the big boys
The head basketball coach and eight or so of the best players from an all-black college in Pennsylvania staffed the camp kitchen. After they had finished the dining hall cleanup after supper, the players would practice basketball in the camp recreation building. The younger and smaller campers could only watch the college guys and marvel at their basketball skills. Except for one camper. At age 13, Tommy Moore spent much of his free time practicing basketball, and he could shoot and dribble better than most kids his age. After asking the college players if he could shoot a few baskets with them, Tommy showed that he could give them a run for their money on the court. Thereafter, he was welcome to practice with the big guys.

After practicing basketball one evening, the players asked Tommy if he wanted to join them for a little late-night fun, after the campers and counselors had turned in for the evening. The players needed someone to hold a lantern while they went flounder gigging in Bogue Sound, and they promised a share of the night's catch. Because Tommy and I had been friends since the first grade, he decided I should come along as the back-up lantern carrier. I thought this sounded like a great plan. Tommy and I were to turn in at the normal lights-out time and wait for a signal to sneak out of our cabin.

Keeping secrets
Around midnight, I was awakened by someone whispering, "Get up. It's time to go fishing." Tommy and I crept out of the cabin and followed the basketball players northward along the water's edge. When we were safely out of sight of the camp, we lit the lantern, and all started wading out into the dark and spooky waters of Bogue Sound. If you think a lot of weird things inhabit the ocean during the day, you can really get nervous walking around in the water at night. I kept thinking about sting rays and jellyfish and all those other creepy creatures that campers talk about to scare each other.

One basketball player reassured me that we weren't going in any deeper than his knees, which didn't comfort me much, since he was more than six feet tall and I was a pretty short kid. But I got over my worries when our lantern light started to illuminate flounder lying flat on the sandy bottom. We all began to gig some nice-sized flounder and soon filled the pail carried by one of the players.

After completing our respectable catch, we blew out the lantern and walked back to camp. Strangely enough, no one seemed to have seen or heard our midnight expedition. We were quite pleased with our extracurricular outing, and we agreed to try it again before the camp season ended.

High and dry
The delicious flounder supper the next night made our escapade seem even more daring, and we repeated the midnight flounder hunt before Camp Morehead closed for the summer. While continuing to enjoy flounder for nearly 50 more years, I know I've never tasted better than the ones Tommy and I brought back from our midnight fishing adventures. This and many other special memories make me realize what wonderful experiences Cap'n Pat and his successors provided until Camp Morehead finally closed in 1995.

Tommy Moore went on to letter in football, baseball, and, of course, basketball at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. My sports interests have included running, hiking, back-packing, and cross-country skiing for many years in New Mexico and now in Colorado.

I think it may be about time to try midnight flounder gigging again.

Henry Atwater lives in landlocked Fort Collins, Colorado. Although he moved away from North Carolina in 1961, Henry spent two summers at Camp Morehead in the early 1950s.

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