The term ‘fishing’ is a little misleading. An iron rake towed behind a boat was used to retrieve the bombs from the lake bottom. When the lake bed was unsuitable for raking, divers dressed in bulky diving gear had to literally walk the bottom to harvest the day’s rewards. The salvaged lead would bring 21 to 25 cents per pound (9.5 to 11 cents per kg).
The Belyea Brothers from Simcoe Island, near Kingston, Ontario, operated “The Duke”, built by Port Dover’s George Gamble in 1932. The Duke was the first welded-steel fish tug on the North Shore of Lake Ontario and was also the first to be fitted for bomb diving . Photo courtesy of Lorne Joyce.
Port Credit optometrist, Lorne Joyce, born in 1926, joined the navy as a teenager just before the war ended. Joining the navy was a natural for Lorne as his ancestors were all seafaring people who fished in the North Seas of England in 1837. His grandparents arrived in Bronte, Ontario in 1871. By 1875, they were among the owners of the 17 operating schooners. By 1919, his parents settled in Port Credit and fished herring in the deep cold waters there. Fishing, however, wasn’t the only activity for the Joyce family.
Lorne’s father had purchased land along the waterfront and at the mouth of the Credit River. He owned the 2.5 acres (1.01 ha.) where the Port Credit Arena is now situated.
Fishing boats had to be modified to ‘fish for bombs’ but the modifications were fairly easily done.
“The rigs used by the fishermen were similar to highway tow trucks of the day. They designed an ‘A’ frame of about six-inch diameter (15 cm) piping mounted on base plates near each side of the boat’s transom. It would lean outward, aft so that the peak of the “A” frame was clear of the stern and held in place by standing cables or pipes running forward and down to the gunwales on each side,” said Mr. Joyce. “A ‘rake’ was attached to the apparatus.”
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