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CarolelleLast updated 12/13/2011(Note - These pictures were sent to me by a fella name Pat Patrick, who skippered the Carolelle the summer of 1979 or 80. He took these pictures during that time and sent them to Swede in December 2011 after seeing him for the first time in 30 years at the funeral of Jim Harry (owner/skipper of the Althea, pics below. The Carolelle was an oyster schooner built before 1900 converted to surf clamming by Swede in 1967. Surf clamming pretty much dried up after the 1976 Pollution Kill. Swede tied the Carolelle up to the dock and started packing fish instead of surf clams in 78 or 79. The boat wasn't doing anything and Pat wanted to try his hand at scalloping so Swede said "Why not? Go ahead." Anchor001  Anchor announcing you have arrived at Swede's Dock. It pretty much represents what you would find there (modernity wise). Anchors like that are not uncommon along the Jersey Coast. Very often they were turn anchors used by old sailing ships being driven towards shore in heavy seas. A ship would drop the anchor allowing the ship to fetch up, turn into the wind, cut the anchor loose and beat its way offshore. Clam boats, who seldom worked more than 15 miles off shore, would catch the anchors and bring them in. This particular anchor was brought in by the Jack and Doris, a Delaware Bay Oyster schooner rigged out for ocean surf clamming in the early 1970's after oystering petered out in the late 50's.. O001  Front office (and one of the very few pictures of "That Fucking Swede" (as he was most frequently referred to). Notice the grate in front of the door. Swede didn't like to have sand tracked all over his office so he cut the bottom off of a $300 clam cage. Wasn't his cage. D001  Truck Swede bought to truck 300lb cakes of ice from the ice house in Neptune (10 miles north) to ice the fish with. Eventually he bought his own ice machines and he converted the truck body to an ice house with two 10 ton ice machines on top. See that bitt (brown thing center bottom). It came from a ship junkyard (Swede bought very little new stuff) and probably came off on old coal barge. The bitt was welded to a 1/2" thick steel plate about 3' square and was a couple feet high or so. Sometimes the bitt was out in the yard by itself and somebody would be backing up without seeing it, knock the bitt over making the plate pop up and act like a lever, which would then lift the back wheels off the ground. Great laughter was had by all. (Except for Frank, a local restaurant owner who had his gas tank holed once.) D002  W001  Laurence "Whitey" Nelson, the dock boss. C001  A view from the deck of the Carolelle towing for scallops. C002  Butch Morton(?), a State of Mainer, waiting for the scallop dredge to come up. C003  A view from the pilothouse. C004  A view from the pilothouse. C005  A view from the pilothouse. C006  Lots of rigging, all hand made. No store bought stuff on Swede's boat. C007  The scallop dredge on deck. C008  Captain Pat welding shoes on the dredge. (Swede didn't pay for no hired welders either.) C009  More rigging. C010  The boys picking the deck after a tow. Looks like they picked up a couple pebbles too. Always a little excitement rigging them to go back overboard. {sigh} C011  Another tow. Doesn't look like they had enough to set back out. Hence the dredge hanging on the rail. C012  Butch's dog. A real sea dog that one, too. Once they came in after 5 or 6 day trip, he jumped on the dock before the first line was out and mounted the Killer (Swede's old female shepard mix.) A real scalloper's dog, that's for sure. Typical goddam scalloper, jump the first thing that moves after a trip. Swede took the Killer to the vet the next day to have her "fixed", just in case. He didn't need any more roughnecks around the dock than he already had. C013  A steady sail. Old timers put them up to help them steer while towing. Also to slow the boat's roll. Dunno how much good they were in either case but it was better than nothing, I guess. C014  Couple bushel of scallops. Looks like pretty small stuff. C015  By the look of the lobster pots up forward, they must have gotten into somebody's gear. It was not uncommon to foul with lobster gear, usually at night when no one can see the flags. No fun for the scallopers having to clear the gear. And really no fun for the lobsterman to lose his gear. C016  W002  Bobby Nelson (Whitey's son). Looks like he's washing the deck of the Althea here. A001  I don't recognize this boat. A002  Or this one. A003  The Althea rounding the bend of Manasquan Inlet. A004  Ditto. A005.jpg  Ditto. End Carolelle Pictures"He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know." Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) <<<<<<<<<<  Or ... 
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