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FORM A
STATE: Washington
NAME OF WORKER: Roy Hanna
ADDRESS: Seattle, Washington.
DATE: December 22, 1938
SUBJECT:: Local Norse Folklore
1, Informant's Name and Address: A. Hal Lokken, Vessel Owner's Association,
Pier 8, Seattle, Wash. B. Capt. Otis Svensen, same address.
2. Date and time of interview. Morning of Dec. 22, 1938
3. Place: Association office, mezzanine of Pier 8.
4. Own information.
5. Alone
6. Plain but comfortable office. Maps, stuly of fish growth by stages, other item
on walls. Overlooks Pier 8 slip.
FORM B
STATE: Washington
NAME OF WORKER: Ray Ranna
JiDDRESS: Seattle, Washington
DATE: December 22, 1938
SUBJECT: Local Norse Folklore
Name and Address of Informant: Chris Svensons kishing Vessel Owners, Association,
Pier 8, Seattle, Wash. Hal Lokken„ Secy. of same, same address.
1. Ancestry: Norwegian
2. Norway. Did not care to tell place. About 1897 or 1898.
(Norse people do not care to answer questions relating to themselves. They are by
trait, shy and retiring. Questions along this line are not prudent as they are
the quickest method of drying your informant into sullen silence. Smartest
thing is to wait and get this, if at all, when it is told voluntarily.
LOCAL NORSE FOLKLORE
So I said to Hal, "Migord, you gotta save me. I am sent to chase dawn some
'legends. You know. Of the Xishermen and loggers and such and all the week long
I have been toeing your clam -mouthed brothern around for some original stuff and
what do I get?"
"All they say is I'Vat vas I want and "I dunno I dunnorf and tap another cud
out of their snoose cans. You gotta save me, Hal?"
Hal Lokken is the permanent secretary of the Fishing Vessel Owners' Association,
the aunday name of Seattle's halibut fleet. He is a smooth collegian with just enough
muscle to be reasonably impressive round and about and is one of a handful on the water-
front who can get those Nome fishermen to unbutton and talk. If Hal says "Okay," they
can unwind some wild sagas that will give you a olyrhological message. If he says "No"
they can't even speak English. You see, Hal is an important guy to me right now,
Well, Hal is just touching up a rather livid story in which a dory capsized. The
dorymatea grasp the hull but after hours of :swimming one of them is taken to the Heaven
of all good fishermen. Because he dreaded a watery grave his partner tied his body
feat to the stern and went drifting on crying for help.
The rescue boat not only found a corpse but a virtual lunatic crouched on the
overturned hull. With each roll of the tide the body, which was floating free, seamed
to reach up with ghastly arms and clutch for him.
We are sitting in the dock office and this is just jelling and I am watching the
misty sound shore and catching the ka-plot-ka-plot, ka-plot of a trawler mottling around
the dock.
About this time we are joined b one of the skippers. He is a slight, wiry chap
with the usual yeatherbeaten face. NOt particularly outstanding but just to build my
man up)I will record that he has great terrifying hands, the kind that can tear the
shank right off a bullock and the quick intense eyes of a kingfisher,
LOCAL NORSE FOLKLORE (Cont.)
"You know that outfidt they had swell rifles but dey couldn't hit a sea lion's
ass at twently f)od. They shoot at a cub bear aboudt as far as across dis dock and
he had to run a block for cover but dey all miss. ASad Studebaker-- you know what he
did? He took his swell rife andt slung it over in a hundredt fathom. fee he didt.
SEA LIONS
"And those damn sea lion. Says one tribt last season they took aboudt a thousand
pound of halibut from my lines. And by God they always take the biggest fish. We had
all lines down and the catch was coming good went dose buggers come along. We didlt
have a rifle aboard dammit and they lay right there in aboudt fifty fathom and snap off
the big ones when we pulled them up. The Provincial government kills them off every
year.
MONIES
"Ooonies.
Dat's another thing dat give us hell. Dey follow right after us ven ye
are setting bait and snap up the herrings. By Gollone of them take ten herring right
after another. We test them on day. Ve pudt sticks in the herrings and I swear that damn
birdt swollaw ten in a raw. They are bi* birdtas wingspread tens twelve feet. NO one
'mum where they g0 to nest but I think the Fiji Islands.
IN THE FIJIS
I made three trips to the Fijias too. Dat vas in lar time. We went after guano
a couple of times for/4namite you know. when I made a trip for copra. Says we lay
there, the French Islands waiting for a load of that bird crap for six months. Dose
girls. say/ Dv are old there at fifteen there. You know the flu had swept through
some of the villages and they all took to houses in the trees. By God, kidt, you lay
up with a girl in a big tree when thewid is blowing. There is some fun.
THE LEGEND OF THE JAPANESE ADMIRAL
"Hal Yes. A tousand stories. There was the time —that was long time ago-- the
Indians on Vancouver Island used to put all a man's property on his grave when he die.
Well, one time myself and anodder fellow we searched one of dose cemeteries for a good
pair of boots and what do we find? Someone had been buried just that day and on his
grave was one of does old phonographs with a horn. A record was on.
We wound it up
LOCAL NORSE FOLKLORE
and it started paying "Goin' Home."
01:hat Japanese Admiral. Yes, by Cod, dat is true. I sew him. That vas in Ucluelet
about six, seven year ago, We put in there in a storm. The Canadian Customs dey good
fellows you know. They ask us over to eat and dat evening day invite us to a Japanese
fishermen's meeting. The Japs was just organizing then.
"And you know, when one got up to talk all the rest rose and bowed to the floor.
He is round and short man and he vas an admiral in the Japanese Navy during the 'lasso
Japanese War\
“He got into a tighdt spodt and blew the country and settled up there on the
Island. But dadt is true. he was a high Admiral at the battle of Port Arthur.
DOTS AND DASHES
"Hai You dondt know what suffering ins, Kidt. Say, you see that picture, what
is it-- 'Captains Courageous-- where dat guy got gaffed with a hook.
"Say dadt is nothing. See dia knuckle (2nd finger, right hand). You know haw I
gott dat? Well I got hooked when a fifty -horsepower windlass was reeling the line in.
"I got hooked in this knuckle and I vas too far away to stop the Motor and no one
could hear me shout. So I pul7 with that hook in my finger against fifty horse1 Say.'
All the damn doctors wanted to take my handt off but I save it myself, by God!
Oh, ve find lots of things. Last season we pick up the rotor off the speed log of
a Canadian patrol boat that went down with all handta in lets see-- 19120 I think.
In two hundredt fathom, too. Just one tiny hole to hook it but the line was dragging
on the bottom and it snagged.
tiVell hell, kidt, I could go on,-- whadt I couldn't tell you. hut I got to go aboard.
By God if you put that in the paper I trow you if the dock. Good bye, now?'
Well, so that is that. I offer you an hour's worth of cigar smoke from Captain
Chris Bvensen of the F. C. hergert, halibut trawler out of Seattle.