Lake "Treasures"

1964

Many years ago my dad bought or was given a double bus seat and he put it at the end of the long lakefront dock. He thought it would come in handy for relief from standing when fishing from the dock, especially for older adults. He didn't attach it as it was very heavy. It was there for a short few days and then one day it disappeared! Completely gone! There were many suggested reasons as to where it went. The wind blew in into the lake. Someone pushed it into the lake. The entire thing was stolen. Although it was never spotted even when the swimmers tried to find it through hundreds of underwater searches, the conclusion is that it is there, way down deep. The end of the very long dock was over deep water. The fear was that someone would hit it during a running dive as the board was removed several years before the seat was placed there. It never happened. 

When a large float was launched further out into the water, it was put in place each of many summers. It was taken out each fall season. "What held it out there?" you ask. There was a heavy and thick long chain attached to a very heavy idler iron wheel from a dozer at the bottom.  One of the family men, usually Mike, would carry the chain, its end secured by a rope at the shore, out to the float, dive deeply underneath it and then attach the chain to a fixture on its bottom. There came a time when the float was disintegrating and the process was becoming difficult so the structure was pushed onto the beachfront for its last days. The wheel remains at the bottom.

A friend lost her 14k gold bracelet one year, a daughter lost her necklace and another guest lost her ring.  Several fishing poles were lost when large hooked fish grabbed the bait and swam away, eventually taking the poles out of the children's hands. There are at least one pair of sneakers down there that were bumped off of the dock and floated away to sink later. This was only in "our" area, and I wonder what other items are bottomed. I do know that a couple of neighbor kids recently lost their phones, but one retrieved hers and the other's is gone for good. This is what prompted me to write this story.

The "Mister" is mowing the dam and my brother is in the rowboat with his wife and a couple of our kids swimming.

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