by Jim Wellman
The only effects that he still carries from the accident are a few scars on his wrist where the buoy rope had burned through the skin and had crushed several bones.
Very few people, if any, who had been trapped underwater for as long as Julien d’Entremont had, lived to tell the tale. It is truly miraculous that the twenty-two-year-old fisherman from Pubnico, Nova Scotia, didn’t make his final voyage on May 13, 2002.
Everything Except Money
Frank Greenham has worked for a living almost all of his eighty-two years and he is still busier than most people half his age with full-time jobs. He says the minute a person stops working is the minute they start dying. He remembers cutting out cod tongues, splitting fish, and doing other odd jobs for businessmen in his hometown of Twillingate, Newfoundland, when he was only nine and ten years old. Occasionally they’d give him fifty cents for his labour. A couple of years later he went schooner fishing “down on the Labrador” with his father, skipper Chum Greenham. He says he was paid for his work, but like most working children in those days, he was expected to hand over all his earnings to his parents. “Mother would go to the store and buy a bit of clothes or some baking powder—she’d get two or three things out of my fifty cents,” Frank laughs.
Frank landed his first real job for real money in 1944. Captain Billy Roberts wanted someone to work in the engine room of his cargo boat, and at the ripe old age of fourteen, Frank landed the job. “Captain Billy asked Father if he knew anyone who could start and shut off an engine. My father said ‘the young fella can do that,’ and Captain Billy said ‘send him down.’”
Although he was just a boy, Frank was a quick study. He admits to knowing precious little about engines at the time, but by the time they arrived in Bay de Verde with a load of freight, the captain sat him down for a chat. “Captain Billy asked how much pay I wanted for the job and I told him that I didn’t know anything about money, so I asked him how much he was offering. ‘Fifty dollars a month,’ he said. I thought, ‘Geeze, I’m going to be a millionaire,’” Frank laughs. His father thought it was good pay, too. “When I told Father, he said, ‘Take care of your money, and by the time you are my age you won’t have to work anymore.’”
Frank Greenham says he never wastes anything. Leftover wood from large projects is used to make little things like this bucksaw model. (Jim Wellman photo)
That initial trip was a less than auspicious beginning to the technical world of engineering, but Frank Greenham went on to become a master mechanic, sometimes working on ships and sometimes with manufacturers on land. His career would see him holding down positions as a mechanic with companies including General Motors in Toronto.
Despite having only a grade three education, Frank kept upgrading his reading and writing skills to become a self-educated man with considerable academic abilities. Among other pursuits, he has kept an extensive diary outlining every significant event of his entire life. “I sit down at the end of nearly every day and write,” he says. One of his diary entries documents a seabird-hunting trip in 1965 that almost cost him his life.
Frank’s land-based career lasted just a few years. The call of the sea brought him back home, where he worked as engineer on vessels of various designs and sizes, including sealing ships, freighters, and fishing boats.
Back in Frank’s day, replacement engine parts had to be ordered and could take weeks to arrive from St. John’s or the mainland. He remembers numerous occasions when he would cobble something together as a makeshift part to keep the engines running. In fact, Frank says the ability to make parts was as essential as knowing how to operate engines. His son Jack, a fishing captain, says his dad is so in tune with engines and what makes them tick that he can stand on the wharf and listen to an engine running and tell you if there’s something wrong and what the problem is.
Frank retired from working for other people more than twenty years ago. He has an interest in the family fishing enterprises operated by his sons Jack and Bill. Father and sons live as neighbours on several acres of beautifully landscaped property that Frank bought in Comfort Cove–Newstead many years ago.
Frank’s main reason for getting up every morning now is to work on his number one passion in life these days—his woodworking crafts. While his professional skills were mechanical, Frank also developed a tremendous talent for creating beautiful works of art from local pine and birch wood. He’s sold some of his creations, but at any given time there are dozens of pieces available. His many years at sea obviously influence his preferences in what to build. He has model boats of various shapes and sizes, all built with precision replication of the entire superstructure, sails, on-deck gear, and riggings. If you look closely through one of the windows, you will notice that he is just as fussy about making his boats perfectly realistic inside as well as out. As a final detail, many of his boats and buildings are electronically wired for lighting. With the flick of a switch, the red and green port/starboard navigational lights become real lights—not just painted woodcarvings.
But Frank Greenham’s woodworking pieces are not confined to boats and ships only. His oversized garage/workshop situated near his house is filled with model churches, lighthouses, fishing stages, schools, bobsleighs, anchors, killicks, and much more. Some are replicas of real structures, old and new, while others are creations of his imagination. But Frank’s personal favourites are stored in a special place. With years of work invested in three model schooners, each measuring about six feet long, Frank is leaving nothing to chance. The models are stored in the basement of his home where they are less vulnerable to fluctuating temperatures and possible vandalism in the garage.
Two of Frank Greenham’s prized model schooners
(Jim Wellman photo)
Frank beams when he shows those creations. He enthusiastically explains the stories of each one, but you would be forgiven for not being totally attentive to Frank’s chatter, because the first glance at the model ships evokes a jaw-dropping moment and it is impossible not to get lost in amazement at the detail of each ship. “Each one of them took months to complete,” he says. And how much would he sell one for? “About three thousand,” he replies. Three thousand dollars doesn’t seem like much for hundreds of hours of labour and expenses, but Frank is realistic about the market. “Local people have no interest in it at all—to them it’s just another boat and we’re here in little Comfort Cove, Newfoundland, and not many outsiders come by here,” he explains. But again Frank is philosophical about that, too. He puts it all in the context of fishing. “We probably have a million dollars’ worth of fishing gear around here. We have traps and seines and all kinds of stuff here,” he says, gesturing to the huge garage and other storage areas, a large and expensive welding shop, a tow-off boat used for seining, speedboats, and other expensive items that are considered tools of the trade for a large fishing enterprise. And then there are all the woodworking tools in his home basement and in the welding shop next door. “I wound up with everything except money,” he laughs with a shrug of the shoulders.
Spending two or three hours with Frank Greenham is merely enough time to whet the appetite to spend days with this fascinating man. His talent seems boundless. He is a captivating storyteller who can spin endless yarns, and he is also a genuinely nice man.
He’s Not Gone Yet
If Roy Fowlow were a cat he’d probably be near the last of his nine lives.
The inshore fisherman from Codroy on Newfoundland’s west coast has had more than his share of close calls at sea, starting when he was only sixteen, while the most recent “incident” was just last year.
Roy grew up in Port Anson, a small community on the northeast coast of Newfoundland. Most fishermen in Port Anson went farther north to fish in summer—some would go to the Grey Islands or Labrador, while others would go to Fishot Islands near Conche on the Northern Peninsula. Those islands were well-known as excellent cod fis
hing grounds.
In the 1960s, many inshore fishermen on Newfound-land’s northeast coast owned nothing more than a trap skiff or even a punt as fishing vessels. It was common practice for many of them to travel north on board Canadian National (CN) coastal boats and return home in the fall. CN implemented special runs for the fishermen, stopping in a dozen or so ports to load boats and men in the spring and drop them off at various popular summer destinations. Another CN vessel would then pick them up in late August or early September for the return trip home.
In 1960, Roy’s father, Joshua “Jossie” Fowlow, decided that he would go to Fishot Islands for the summer fishery. The plan was to take Roy with him and they would stay with friends and either jig fish from their little boat or work with a trap crew. Meanwhile, George Wiseman, another Port Anson fisherman, also planned to go to Fishot Islands that summer. George had a longliner with the wheelhouse on the back and a forecastle (foc’sle) up front. It was also decked with a hatch near the middle. George asked if Jossie would like to join him and one of his sons on his longliner rather than go alone. Jossie thought it sounded like a good idea, so he accepted, although in retrospect Roy says the small longliner was not properly equipped for that type of trip. Navigational equipment consisted of nothing more than a compass, and the engine was a small, fifteen-horsepower Kelvin diesel. There was no VHF Radio or any communication equipment at all.
“It wasn’t a boat meant to go offshore,” Roy claims.
They stopped at Little Bay Islands for groceries at S. T. Jones & Sons Ltd. on the first day of their journey, and by next morning the crew had tied up in Shoe Cove. But even before they made it to Shoe Cove, Roy experienced the first close call of what would be a terrible trip.
Roy decided to take a nap that night, and while the others were on deck or in the wheelhouse, he went to the forecastle and climbed into a bunk. After an hour or so sleeping, Roy woke with a severe headache and felt very sick. He eventually made it up the steps from the galley to the deck, and despite the rain and cold, he decided the deck was the best place to be, because it was fairly obvious to him that he was suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning caused by diesel fumes from the engine room, not vented properly to the outside. The sixteen-year-old eventually started to feel a bit better, but staying inside a few more minutes might have made his nap a permanent sleep.
The crew arrived in Shoe Cove and the next morning they got up to get ready to head across White Bay to Fishot Islands. Jossie asked George if he was sure about leaving, because the forecast called for a stiff breeze of wind later that day. Roy explains that they were towing a trap skiff and another small boat behind the skiff. Also, Jossie’s rowboat was in the trap skiff. Roy says his father was concerned about getting caught in rough weather, because having two boats towed behind the longliner might cause problems. George, the skipper, listened to Jossie, but at that moment the weather couldn’t have been better. Roy says there wasn’t a ripple on the ocean, and because everything looked so ideal, George decided that the forecast must be wrong and they were soon headed to White Bay.
Everything went well that morning as the Port Anson fishermen rounded Cape John into White Bay. About noon the wind picked up, and by mid-afternoon “all hell broke loose,” Roy says.
Winds were strong and seas were high, and just as Jossie had feared, the small boat behind the trap skiff came riding down from the crest of a large wave and crashed into the stern of the skiff, causing considerable damage to both.
The smaller boat started taking on water, and with the increased weight the tow rope snapped and, within minutes, the small boat was nowhere to be seen.
As it turned out, losing the small boat was only the beginning of several weeks of misery for the crew of four. A short while later, the engine blew a cylinder head gasket and the little longliner was helpless in the middle of White Bay in a vicious storm.
“Nobody could even try to work on the motor because all you could do was hang on. An anchor and some other stuff that was on deck all rolled overboard—we lost all that,” Roy says. Seas were shipping across the deck of the boat as if it were half-submerged. Roy says he thinks the only thing that kept them afloat was the load of lumber that George had stored in the fish hold. The lumber was dry and floated when the hold half filled with water, giving the boat an upward buoyancy.
Compounding their misery, they also lost their food. The supplies they bought just one day previous in Little Bay Islands were in the galley and the diesel fumes that nearly killed Roy had also contaminated their groceries. For nearly two days the two men and their sons held on to whatever they could to keep from washing overboard as the little boat tossed around White Bay like a cork.
Roy remembers mentally preparing himself for death. “No one can explain that feeling,” he says.
After accepting that death appeared imminent, it was just a matter of waiting for it to happen—but when it didn’t, it seemed a bit surreal and difficult to reconcile that he was still alive, because it felt like things didn’t go according to plan.
While Roy was preoccupied with thoughts of dying, the seas finally calmed and they could finally work on the engine. Eventually they managed to get the small motor operating, but after several hours limping across White Bay, the engine died again. This time they were about five miles off Williamsport and, although it would take several hours, they decided their only hope was to try and make it ashore in rowboat. Tired, wet, and hungry, they finally made land and found a man who owned a schooner. A few hours later the schooner towed the longliner to safety in Williamsport.
Roy’s memory of the next week to ten days are more cheerful.
“The people of Williamsport treated us like royalty—they couldn’t do enough for us,” he says with a smile.
After repairs were done to the engine, the Wisemans and Fowlows were once again on their way. But the summer of 1966 wasn’t destined to be a good one for the Port Anson group. Roy says it was one of the worst fishing seasons in memory in the Fishot Islands area. After several months away, a near-death experience from poisoning, and then a close call in the storm that nearly killed them all, Roy remembers his father had to sell their rowboat for $10 to buy food and get back home.
At the young age of sixteen, Roy Fowlow nearly died twice in 1966, but those brushes with death were not to be his last. Roy left Port Anson when he married and moved to Codroy on Newfoundland’s southwest coast. It was there that he came much too close to dying, but through steadfast determination he survived an ordeal that would have killed most people.
Aerial view of Codroy, located on Newfoundland’s southwest coast. Cape Anguille lighthouse can be seen in the background. (Photo courtesy of Fisheries and Oceans Canada)
Friday, May 8, 1987, was a fine day in the Codroy area. Seas were calm and winds were light. It was a good day to set traps to begin the spring lobster fishery. It was cool and Roy remembers there were lots of ice chunks, known locally as “ballycatters,” along the shoreline.
He started work early in the morning and spent the day setting traps, and by three-thirty in the afternoon he had only fifty traps left to set. Ordinarily he would wait for the next day to finish because it would be late evening before he could finish the whole amount. But, anxious to get a good start to the season, Roy figured that since the fine weather was holding, he’d go back with one last load. By 4:00 p.m. his twenty-foot open speedboat was loaded and he was headed back to the fishing grounds to finish the day. That decision came very close to being the last one he would ever make.
After loading the traps he decided to set five of them in an area known as Black Cliff, about three miles along the shoreline from the community of Codroy.
“Black Cliff was a good patch of ground for lobster, but it was where I made my big mistake that day,” Roy muses. “Instead of dropping the five traps from the front of the boat, which would have balanced and tilted the
vessel down more by the stern, I dropped them from the back because it was easier—I guess we learn by our mistakes.”
The consequences of his mistake soon became apparent. After leaving Black Cliff, Roy turned his boat toward Stormy Point, also a good fishing area. While steaming along he noticed that there wasn’t any water running back from the front of the boat, as would normally be the case while steaming with a load of traps on board.
“There’s always water flicking in over the bow when she’s loaded and it always runs back to the stern, so when I noticed that there was no water coming back, I got concerned,” he explains. Deciding to check it out, Roy reduced the engine’s power to have a look up front, but within seconds he was in big trouble. “As soon as I cut the motor, she went down head first in a split second—she made a nosedive just as if you tipped her up by the stern and drove her down.”
Before Roy could comprehend what was happening, he found himself in the ocean with no sign of his boat. Dazed by the suddenness of his predicament and shocked by the icy cold water, Roy instinctively swam around for a while trying to assess what, if any, options he had for survival. Estimating that he was nearly two miles from Codroy, swimming to shore in near-zero-degree water was not feasible without an immersion/survival suit. There were no boats nearby, so for a while it seemed that Roy’s future was measured by mere minutes. But luck, or, call it what you will, was on his side.
“All of a sudden the boat popped up from underwater like a big bubble,” he said, explaining that all the traps must have fallen from the boat and the buoys provided enough buoyancy to bring the speedboat back to the surface.
As comforting as the sight of the boat was at first, Roy was far from secure. The boat was bottom up and still almost entirely submerged. “I swam over and held on to the prop of the motor and tried to pull myself onto the bottom, but wet fibreglass is very slippery and I just couldn’t do it.”