Wind Shift at Peaked Hills - Paperback

by Martin R. Bartlett (Author)

The Selective Service was offering Leonard Hill two opportunities. He could sit in a Marine Corps watchtower and observe his mirror across the fence line at Guantanamo, Cuba, or he could sit in a U.S. Army watch tower and observe the largest minefield in the world on the 38th parallel in Korea. He chose a third option. He chose to sit in a Coast Guard watchtower overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, a decision he would soon regret; a decision that would take him four years to overcome.

Hill's "on the job" recovery program takes place on Captain Tommy Martin's 70-foot longliner Tecumseh with its crew of three. We use the term crew loosely because harpooner Sam Santos was not above a little extracurricular hunter/gathering when the opportunity presented itself. This activity does not interrupt pursuit of fishing operations until Sam goes missing and the Tecumseh needs to ask the U.S. Coast Guard for assistance.

Wind Shift will take you from the masthead of the fishing vessel Tecumseh to the slaughter house, from the harpoon pulpit to the propeller shaft stuffing box. This tale of salty endeavor will leave you feeling you could comfortably walk aboard a fishing vessel and be at home. The illustrations will temper any such enthusiasm.

Author Biography

Martin Bartlett served on lifeboat stations, ice breakers, and port security in the Coast Guard during the 1950s. He ran boats and tagged hundreds of tuna with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution while promoting and documenting the U.S. east coast longline fishery for swordfish. Later, with the National Marine Fisheries Service and University of Georgia, he engaged in exploratory fishing and gear research resulting in the fishery for swordfish in the Gulf of Mexico. For the next twenty years as owner/operator of the longliner Penobscot Gulf, he fished from Nova Scotia to Texas opening up the swordfishery between Florida and Cape Hatteras. He fished the food chain from swordfish, and tuna down to dogfish and skate wings before taking the Penobscot Gulf to the Gulf of Mexico for a short career of sponging. His articles have appeared in On the Water, Spritsail, National Fisherman, Commercial Fishing News, Commercial Fisheries Review, and several scientific journals. Bartlett has "retired" to fresh water in midcoast Maine, running a summer camp for a dozen grandchildren and keeping an eye out for the dorsal wake of an unlucky trophy brown trout.