I was on Alki beach with my two sisters, while they were
sunbathing, I went for a walk down the beach. I would stop and pick up
"Sand dollars" and other sea creatures, and put them in my bucket. I
was a long ways down the beach from my sisters, when I noticed a boat
out in the water, coming in towards the beach.
I just stood there, and watched. The boat did not slow down, it
hit the beach, and then the bow came up out of the water, that's when
I saw the "Sharks Teeth" painted on the bow. The thing drove right on
the beach, it had wheels! The driver turned the thing around, with the
bow facing the water, then the back door {ramp} opened, and ten people
walked out of it.
A man came down the ramp, carrying a sign, he walked a little
ways out from the thing, and pushed the legs of the sign in the sand.
It read:. RIDES $1.00 per person 10-person minimum
I walked over to the man and asked, " What is this thing?" He
said" Its a Duck, the marines use these out in the Pacific during the
war, to land on the islands." " I told him, it was the neatest thing,
I ever saw" Then I went running back up the beach.
When I got to where my sisters were, there was a bunch of boys
standing around my sisters. I knew I was going to get what I wanted. I
asked one sister for a dollar and got it, and then I went over to my
other sister, and got a dollar from her too. The one thing
teenage sisters did not want, was to have their little seven year old
brother hanging around, when they had boys to talk to. With the money
in hand, I went running back to where the Duck was parked.
On my second trip in the Duck, heading back to the beach. I
could see my sisters walking down the beach; I just knew they were
looking for me. I walked off the ramp, then went running up the beach,
to where my sister had laid out the blankets, and sat down and waited.
"Where have you been? John." they both asked.
"I have been here the whole time"
After fact ... Down along the Columbia River, just outside of "The
Dalles" Oregon, sits a Duck tied up to a dock. A cattle rancher uses
the Duck to haul cattle out to an Island in the river. The Duck does
not have shark teeth painted on it, but I get a smile on my face every
time I see it.
Go
to Rewind the Fifties Home
