Sand Island Remembered.Pdf
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WHY REMEMBER? This is but one story of Sand Island. It is not history. For history is that which took place before my time, and before those who would share remembrances with me and a bit of their own lives on Sand Island. Much of what I write, I saw. That which I did not see was told to me by Uncle Carl [Dahl] and Aunt Alma [Dahl], and by Uncle Mel [Dahl]—each of whom spent a lifetime, seventy years and more on Sand Island. And by Grandma Palm [Bessie Nelson], Betty’s mother. For Bessie came to Sand Island in 1902, forty years before I was to set foot on Sand Island. I first came to Sand Island, not knowing of Betty’s ties to the island. I would learn that once she had lived here with her father, mother, sister, brothers and grandmother. And here, too, on this island over the years had lived six uncles, six aunts, a step-grandfather and many cousins. And wonderful, caring islander friends. Here would come four brothers, two sisters and their mother, all immigrants from Norway, and for a short time in their lives they would all settle on this place. Sand Island. Then to seek their fortunes elsewhere, some near and far. Christine, Julia, Will, Magnus and Carl would leave. Only one, Ludwig, Betty’s father, would hold ties to this island to this day. For Ludwig Palm would marry Bessie Nelson, born in Bayfield of Norwegian immigrant parents, with family ties to Sand Island from her earliest years. I would come to love Sand Island. And I, too, would be a part of its summer enchantment. And so I would write of Sand Island and chronicle its story. For now that story is ending. For in the five generations of those families in East Bay of whom I write not all but two are gone from Sand Island. Gone are the Dahls, the Hansons, the Bondes, the Norengs, the Moes, the Loftfields, the Bjorns, the Johnsons, the Wellisches, the Aabels. All gone. And a Dr. Diersen and Sven Bergstrom, and Clyde Nerland, too, out of the past. And the Coles, the last to come to East Bay in the sixties, gone too. The Westhagens hold fast. Of Betty’s family, only one brother, Howard Palm, with his family remains. And Betty’s roots… -Erv Tanning, 1981 Each man should have an island Where he can roam the shores And look out on the seas… Wherein each precious hour Midst roaring waves or calm Alone, he lords o’er all he sees. -Erv Tanning In those days, Little Sand Bay was more than just a name… On summer days there was always someone coming and going. By boat or by car. Campers. Picnics and ballgames on weekends. And on holidays where hordes of people. Hermie Johnson was usually to be found around his store, or down around the dock or his fish house. If Hermie was gone, he was on his boat, the Sand Bay, hauling natives and tourists to and from the neighboring Apostle Islands. Or early mornings, lifting nets. Fishnets scattered everywhere, the faint smell of fish in the air, with seagulls soaring in the air or riding the seas, Hermie was always around. Somewhere. In his unwashed white sea-captain’s hat with snooze running down his chin, Hermie was the very picture of an authentic old sea salt. Born in nearby Bayfield, and then raised in that five miles encompassing Sand Island and his Little Sand Bay, his was a lifetime immersed in every facet of the life of this small world. Hermie was authentic, though his tales were often not. But, he knew the sea. And we listened. For Lake Superior was huge it was treacherous. And its storms were legend. As were its tragedies. On that day we gathered driftwood on the beach at Little Sand Bay and lit a bonfire. Across the waters on Sand Island they would see our fire and someone would come for us. For that was the way, then. And, soon, we saw the Eggersund coming across the deep waters, Betty’s Uncle Carl at the helm. - 1 - And there was much joy on Sand Island. It was the summer of ’42, and relatives and friends were waiting for Betty and her soldier-husband. Betty knew the island well. And its people. For here was her heritage. Her mother had first visited Sand Island in 1902 as a little girl and had lived on the island at various times over the years. Betty had lived on Sand Island from May, 1932 to August, 1933. In that year of the Great Depression her whole family would leave the mainland for the island and move into the The Egersund and the Turner at the Johnson Dock on Sand Island, 1942 vacant Edwin Bonde log cabin to survive. Edwin was a brother-in-law to Betty’s father. Married to his sister, Christine. The cabin was in need of repair and so they spent May through July in a guest cabin near the bank at the Loftfield place while they readied the cabin for the long, hard winter. For they must lay in a winter’s provisions. Milk, eggs, beef and potatoes would come from the Noreng farm and apples from the Loftfield orchard, but flour, beans, prunes and other staples must be procured. Howard would snare rabbits for Thanksgiving. He would trap weasels and sell the pelts. He would help his dad cut firewood. There would be no school that year for Howard, Betty and Dick. And Joan was only four. In the spring, Grandma Magdalene, Ludwig’s mother, would come to live with them. And older brother, Leonard, too. For there was no work on the mainland. Betty remembered all this. And so now it was like a homecoming for her. A ten-year reunion. And I would be a part of it. And we would visit every family and explore and roam the world she had known as a ten-year-old. From Lighthouse Bay to the island’s westernmost Shaw Point. We would stay with the Bert Norengs in their new home at East Bay. Farming was ending on the island, and the Norengs were the last to give up. Only a cow or two remained in the barn on their farm inland, now deserted. Land bought from Edwin Bonde and farmed for some thirty years. The old schoolhouse stood at the side of the country road that ran along East Bay, just a short distance inland. School had ceased even before 1932. Once the social center of the island, in Uncle Carl’s schooldays as many as 28 children daily attended grades 1 through 8. Two Model-A - 2 - Fords stood on the road nearby, and a Model-T Ford was next to the Elvis Moe blacksmith shop. The Moe place stood empty. Our days on Sand Island were too few. And the days too short. And we would go to Uncle Carl’s and talk far into the night. There were deep sandstone caves between Swallow Point and Justus Bay to row within, and explore. And great expanses of sandy beaches to gather shiny stones and driftwood. Rocky shores from which to watch the pounding seas and distant ore boats crossing the immense waters beyond Devils Island bound for Sault Ste. Marie and its locks three hundred miles to the East. It seemed always there were ships on the horizon. At night we could see their lights afar. There were cold waters breaking on the beach at East Bay for the hardy to swim and frolic in. Orchards with apples and open fields with wild fruits and wildflowers to relish. Down to the Johnson dock to meet the Turner and watch as they unloaded supplies and took on board the boxes of fish catch destined for Booth Fisheries in Bayfield. Three times a week the Turner came to Sand Island, and always there were excursion passengers to greet. And we would rise early to ride atop Uncle Carl’s Egersund as he went out to sea to lift nets for the day’s catch of trout and whitefish. This was his livelihood. Even as his father before him. We knew, even then, that his father, Harold Dahl, had been lost to these seas. And never found. Setting his first nets of the season in April of 1928 beyond Lighthouse Bay, he was caught in a sudden, terrible storm, the swirling, grinding ice flows preventing his seeking refuge in the Sand Bay channel. Herman Johnson, Sr. and Louis & Elvis Moe who were also setting nets in that area made it to safety in their boats around the outer side of the island to West Bay from where they walked across the island to their homes. And there was hope through the night for Harold. And then great grief. And Carl, far off in the navy in Honolulu, would learn that his dream and premonition of the terrible storm dad come true. And Mel would grieve that he had not been with his father, for he stayed home to break bread. At seventeen, he and his sister, Mable and Carl would mourn for their father. And our Grandma Palm whose widowed mother had married Harold when she was eight, would mourn her step-father. And she would come to Sand Island to take Mel with her and Ludwig. …And as the long, long nets were lifted into the Eggersund we would look far down into the clear waters to see the fish drawn up out of the deep.