Lögberg-Heimskringla - 26.07.1991, Blaðsíða 16

16 • J-ögberg-Heimskringl? • Föstudagun2ö. júlí 1991
by Val Werier
Gus Isfeld is one of the stalwarts of
Lake Winnipeg, Manitoba’s great in-
land sea. He has been fishing the lake
for 68 years and will continue to do so
alone in his skiff despite the handicap
of having one leg.
Mr. Isfeldisintohis81styearandhe
vows he’ll keep fishing until he drops
dead. He is a slight, wiry individual, his
weatherbeaten face lined by life and
the elements, a man so fiercely inde-
pendent that when his car broke down
one day on the highway he walked
home rather than seek a lift.
His hands are oversized and muscu-
lar from hauling in the nets, milking
cows, trapping, gardening. There’s a
certain wistfulness and sadness on his
countenance as if he should do more
with his life.
When I interviewed him and his
wife Bobbi, in their house at Sandy
Hook, in the same section where he
was born, he was erasing the rust from
a butcher’s saw. It had floated off in his
yard during the heavy rains. He says
this saw is best for pruning fruit trees in
his orchard.
His capacity is astonishing. He still
traps. He raises a big vegetable garden,
more than enough to supply his five
children, 15 grandchildren and three
great-grandchildren. He has smoked
fish for sale.
“I was 12 years old when I had the
first net of my own,” he recalls.
“There were ten kids in the family
and they took turns going to school
because there was so much work to
do.”
One day a child would look after the
cattle, gather firewood or go fishing
and then go to school the next day.
That was the custom among all the
families.
In winter, fishing early in his career,
Mr. Isfeld got around by dog team. As
he remembers, he ate frozen sand-
wiches and drank scalding tea. He
boiled the water over a fire in an old 10-
pound syrup tin.
Later he acquired a team of horses,
a giant step forward for it enabled him
to have a caboose as shelter.
In 1931, he gota job for six months
with a fish contractor at the north end
of the lake. The pay was $30 a month.
But at the end of the time the fish
contractor went broke and he never
got a penny.
The lake was thawing at the time
and so the dog sleds could not carry the
normal weight. He had to run behind
the dogs the more than 200 miles back
home.
“We were tired,” he admits.
In 1937, while helping tow out a car
stuck in a ditch, the steel cable uncoiled
in a flash, lashing around his right leg
above the ankle. It was snapped off. He
has had a number of operations on his
leg over the years.
He has been married to Bobbi, a
lively handsome woman, for 52 years,
and she came as a bride with one leg. At
the age of eight her left leg was cut off
on the farm by a hay mower.
“My mother’s hair went snow white
ovemight,” she recalls.
' The Isfelds have a sense of humor.
Richard, the eldest son once observed
to his companions while out himting:
“It’s a wonder I was not bom without
a leg.”
Fishing, as practiced by the Iceland-
ers and others, can be rough and dan-
gerous. It demands courage, stamina,
and a knowledge of the lake, which can
be treacherous for it is comparatively
shallow and can be easily churned up
with the winds.
Years ago, Mr. Isfeld rowed a 14-
foot flat-bottomed boat, beautifully
crafted out of sitka spruce by his
brother. In heavy seas the boat would
vanish from sight in a trough. The boat
rests in his yard. It should be preserved
as an artifact of the brave fishermen of
the lake.
Now Mr. Isfeld has a 20-foot
aluminum skiff with a broad beam and
an outboard motor.
“It was blowing like crazy a couple
of weeks ago, but he was out there,”
says a young fisherman with awe and
admiration. The waves were more than
five feet high. Like many fishermen,
Mr. Isfeld doesn’t swim.
He is one of the first out from the
port at Winnipeg Beach, leaving the
dock at 5 a.m. There’s a skill in
manoeuvering the boat to the nets laid
in the water to collect the fish.
Mr. Isfeld calculates the wind, cuts
the motor, and comes up smartly to get
hold of the buoy. He pulls himself along
the buoy rope until he gets hold of the
net. It’s quite a trick to grab the head of
a fish and squeeze it through the mesh,
at the same time gripping the net under
an arm. Fall is the worst when the
water is ice cold and the winds bitter.
Fishing is unpredictable. Recently
one day he got seven fish out of five
nets. He has harvested as many as seven
boxes (each with 70 pounds offish) out
of one net.
Fishermen apparently never get tired
of eating fish and it remains a steady
diet. In addition to perch and pickerel,
the Isfelds may have boiled bass and
catfish, jackfish casserole, or fish cakes
of various fish. Does he love fishing?
“I sure do,” he responds. “You’re
your own boss and that is one of the big
things. The lake’s like a magnet. It’s in
the blood of the Icelanders. It draws
you back. It’s very beautiful out there.
I couldn’t live away from the lake.”
Mrs. Isfeld loves the lake too — but
only when there is no fishing.
“I just worry about him,” she says.
“It’s very peaceful out there,” he
responds.
Now Mrs. Isfeld doesn’t have to
worry because commercial fishing is
over until September. Gus will be
working in his orchard and garden
raising grapes and apples, asparagus
and potatoes and all manner of
produce. He had ripe tomatoes on June
25.
He’s a remarkable man, called by
one of his fellow fishermen “one of the
last Vikings,” a tribute to his intrepid
spirit.
Courtesy of the Winnipeg Free Press
Congratulations to the
Icelandic Festival
Fishing boats sitting idle in the Gimli harbour