How it all started,...

I can remember Dad bringing us down to Deal Island to fish when I was about 10.  The 3-4 hour drive from Bel Air was no small journey for my brother and I.  My earliest memory was one of us catching lots of fish, and how stinking hot it was on a sunny July day.  I recall my brother becoming dehydrated and us seeking liquid refreshment at Shirley's Shack, an iconic landmark which has only recently departed us.  Actually there were usually 4 of us fishing together- in addition to myself, my brother and my Dad, my Uncle Rudy always joined us, probably because he owned the boat.

About a year or two after Dad's mother passed away in 1978, following her husband who preceded her in 1976, Dad and Rudy decided that they liked Deal Island well enough to purchase a small piece of property on the island.  So, in 1980 they became the proud owners of what we would refer to for years to come as "The Shack".  The small piece of property (60x 90 ft) actually had a building on it.  The building was in poor shape when they bought the property, and it didn't get any better with age.  The shack was likely built in the early part of the 1900's.  It was once owned by Lola Wheatley, whom the street on which it sits is named after.  (The lady they purchased it from was named Mary Reynolds- I never had any connection to this family until I met her granddaughter 29 years later.  Ironically I also met Lola Wheatley's grandson the same year).  I also know that the Shack had been a place of business, including a general store and a gas station.  Inside the Shack you could see where there had been a pass-through window to the kitchen, likely to send food out to the patrons.  There was also other evidence, including the brass Coke bottle opener on one of the support posts.  When we took occupancy of the Shack, it was basically one main room, a couple of partitioned off sleeping areas, a primitive kitchen, and a bathroom.  It wasn't pretty, it wasn't very clean, the roof leaked, the floor was sagging in the kitchen, but it was one of the coolest places ever.  Anyhow, more on this later,.... So, why explain all this? --> Because its really the foundation of everything I am going to tell you about fishing the waters surrounding Deal Island, the waters of Tangier Sound.  Also, I want to preserve this story so that my kids can understand my connection wit this area.