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John Pappalardo commercially fished for close to a decade until fishermen thought he should quit his day job and focus on his volunteer work: Being a voice for the fleet at the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen’s Association.
Fast forward 20 years and Pappalardo is chief executive officer of the successful organization that is now the Fishermen’s Alliance. But during COVID Pappalardo had a recurring nightmare:
Although Brandon Vieira gets up before dawn, his day usually starts hours before.
“I wake up to 10-15 text messages, maybe a few missed calls,” said Vieira.
Vieira manages the Chatham fish pier operation for Red’s Best, so wants it that way. He has asked fishermen to let him know when they are heading out and what they are bringing in. Sometimes that’s at 2 am.
Katie Curran remembers the excitement of catching a fish as a child, the wonder of what might be on the hook. Now she loves fishing just as much and appreciates the peace and satisfaction it brings, how careful study yields welcome results.
“I think of fishing as more than catching a fish. I like learning different techniques and there is effort in learning how to be good,” Curran said. “I don’t look at fishing as something I do, more as an extension of myself.”
George Morton moved to Orleans from Central Massachusetts when he was in his 30s. Before he purchased the Rock Harbor Coffee Shop in the 1960s, he became part of the cast of characters who fished out of the port.
Their camaraderie is why Morton became “Cass a Boo Boo” and the restaurant “Cap’n Cass.” It’s also why Michelle Lamy is painstakingly striving to keep the unique personality of the place alive.
“It’s an iconic establishment needing preservation. I’m into preservation,” she said.
Todd Hnis, captain of F/V Deborah Lee, comes from a legendary fishing family and builds boats that win exceptional praise, even positioned alongside Bentleys to help showcase the luxury car.
Still, Hnis has trouble describing what he does.
“I don’t feel like a commercial fisherman, or a captain, or even a boat-builder,” he said with a chuckle.
Although it was more than a decade ago, Aubrey Ellertson Church has clear memories of standing at the Chatham Fish Pier with other fisheries observers waiting to be picked up by boats they were assigned to that day.
Church lived outside of Boston at the time, working out of ports from Maine to New Jersey gathering data about fishing trips used to help monitor the health of fisheries.
“I remember Chatham being a cool port to go into,” she said.
Caitlin “Caity” Townsend sat in a shaft of sunlight and turned over a lichen-colored, plastic knife handle imprinted with the word “Waterhaul.”
The five-inch object was created from recycled fishing gear and represents the strength and tradition of commercial fisheries as well as its sustainable future – like Townsend herself.
Andrew Spalt sat at a corner table at Fishermen’s View, a popular restaurant along the Cape Cod Canal in Sandwich, with a tortilla-chip ringed bowl of Jonah Crab hummus in front of him and a Jonah Crab melt sandwich in his hand.
The waitress came by and they chatted about the owners, Bob and Denny Colbert, who have been catching Jonah crab for decades and prepare it a host of different ways – Jonah Crab nachos anyone?
Scott MacAllister is in the throes of groundfish season. He has been working 16-hour days, barely sleeping during the hours he has before waking up in the middle of the night to set off from Chatham Fish Pier once again.
So he is exhausted, but running on adrenaline and what seems like a perennially great attitude, when he makes it to his first set of gillnets that have been soaking overnight. This set, like yesterday’s, didn’t have a ton of fish. There are three sets, 15 nets in each, but this is an inauspicious beginning; the first few 300-foot nets come up almost empty or with fish looking like grey pajamas, all floppy and soft. Hag fish, red and snakelike, slide across the deck – they have eaten all the meat.
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