Swamp Skating - Nez

 Swamp Skating

By Nez Nesmith

On the north side of Lyman there used to be the remains of an old river slough,

which we all called the ‘swamp’. It wasn’t very deep, two-to five feet, and had

water most of the year. Some Augusts it almost dried up, but in northwest

Washington nothing was very dry for long. Being only about thirty miles from the

British Columbia, Canada border, and on the west side of the mountain ranges,

most of our winters were cold, but not real cold, like in the upper Midwest states:

Minnesota, North Dakota, and Wisconsin. But, some winters were very cold, and

the swamp would freeze over. The ice was sometimes thick enough to skate on

and we did. Most of us didn’t have real skates, so we just slid on our leather soled

shoes, pretending we were skating. We had fun.

One winter the ice was really thick, and there must have been a dozen or so kids

skating (fake skating) on the swamp. I remember Marily Meyers and Mary Jane

Van der Griff both had actual skates and knew how to actually skate. There were a

couple of kids with clamp-on skates, but they weren’t very successful. The rest of

us were just pretenders enjoying ourselves. Gene Daves, a sixteen year old, who

lived just yards from the swamp was on the ice having a good time “fake skating”

but decided it might be more fun to drive on the ice. He had an old 1930’s jalopy,

which he and his Dad had spent months working on to make it roadworthy. After

several attempts he finally got it started, then drove it through his snowy

backyard down the slope and onto the ice.

Once on the ice he had no traction whatsoever, and mostly spun his wheels and

slid wherever the vehicle decided to go. Most of us moved out of the way to the

edge of the ice and watched. He made a few spins and got the jalopy out to the

middle of the ice, and suddenly the ice broke all around him. He and his jalopy

sank straight down with him at the wheel. With the kids on shore enjoying the

show, he was out there all alone, in about four feet of water and ice. He crawled

out the window and onto the ice yelling “help” and blubbering. A couple of guys

helped the ice-cold and soaking-wet Gene to his house. His Dad was so mad he

couldn’t see straight. The jalopy was in the middle of the swamp in four feet of

water, and they had to figure out what to do and how to get it out the swamp.

Gene’s jalopy sat there in the water from January until the water was low enough

late that summer. They drove a tractor out to the jalopy, hooked a chain to it and

the tractor got stuck in the mud. So they tried a truck on shore with a winch and

cable, but the tractor wouldn’t budge, and the winch started pulling the truck

toward the tractor. So that didn’t work either. They finally ended up getting a

team of old draft horses named Buck and Major to pull the tractor out of the

swamp first and then the jalopy. I think Gene’s jalopy went to the junkyard.

Sometimes the old ways are more reliable.

Nez Nesmith

October 2023