| Summary: | (5:07) Tony Lacher discusses why and how he got started mussel diving. This interview was conducted as part of a joint project of the Music Preservation Society and the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library. This project focus was oral history interviews with area residents who had lived or worked on the Tennessee River.Florence- Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive
Interview with Tony Lacher
November 19, 2007
Waterloo, Alabama
Conducted by Patti Hannah and Rhonda Haygood
Clip 1 of 5
Patti Hannah: It’s Monday November the 19th about one fifteen, one thirty and Rhonda Haygood and Patti Hannah are interviewing Tony Lacher for mussel diving. Did you ever do the uh, the brailing? Did you ever work?
Tony Lacher: No ma’am.
PH: And do that?
TL: Uh, Wayne’s daddy did while, when we were kids, in high, in school. I think he and his brothers did some brailing back years ago.
PH: Did you ever go with them?
TL: No ma’am, unh- uh, I never did go with them. Uh they, uh, had a big camp up at the bend of the river somewhere up there, a Brown owned it I believe. And they would carry them up there and sell them and the Brown, I believe it was Browns was their name but they would cook them out and sell them. But I never did do any brailing, never did go with any of them.
PH: Oh, okay.
TL: I don’t know if Wayne did or not but I didn’t.
PH: Okay. So you just worked basically for a year as a diver?
TL: Full time.
PH: Full time?
TL: Un- huh. I did part time working on the job and doing that on the side, too. When I couldn’t work on construction I’d dive on the side some.
PH: Right. How long did you do that part time?
TL: Ah, probably a year
PH: Okay
TL: Something like that. PH: What did you like about it?
TL: I, just out there by yourself, not anybody messing with you. [ laughter]
Rhonda Haygood: What got you started to doing that?
TL: Well, I just, everybody around here had been doing it for several years, you know, and I’d see their boats down there and I, in the winter time and it would be real cold and I said, “ What’s them crazy things doing out there, you know.” I never did ask them questions about it or anything and some of the rest of them around here local got interested in it. It’s just a good way to make some money on the side, you know, when you couldn’t work. So I just went and got me a little oil- less air compressor, you know, and got my, put it in my little boat and went to diving.
PH: So, do you, you went by yourself?
TL: Yeah.
PH: Okay.
TL: Un- huh
RH: Did someone teach you how to do it or did you just learn from talking to the people?
TL: Just talking to the people and watching and seeing how they did it you know. I started up here in real shallow water in the head of the creek when ya’ll see the lake right down here. I dove, I walked out there for a while before I ever went and got my compressor. I just walked out there and pulled the boat behind me and just feeled them with my feet and bend over and under the water and pick them up. And I got to doing pretty good like that. And I said, “ Foot, this is pretty good.” So, I just went to, went up there and bought me a compressor and put it in my boat where I could pull it along with me and go under, you know, and dive. But I just got, barely got into it gradually like that, by myself. But I never did take any scuba diving or anything like that. But I never did, unh- uh I don’t, there’s several of them around here that never did.
RH: He said a lot of people did not, that it wasn’t necessary, it wasn’t required.
TL: Un- huh. Yeah. Un- huh. I went uh, I went up there to a diving place and got my table to go by so when you wouldn’t get the bends.
PH: Yeah.
TL: I got that table and read it and went by it, you know, how long, how deep, and how long you have to stay for how deep you was diving.
PH: Right
TL: And stuff like that, but I never did dive I think about forty- seven foot, something like that as deep as I ever went in the river channel. PH: How did it feel? How did it feel when you went down that deep?
TL: It’s dark. [ laughter] Especially in the Tennessee River it’s so murky most of the time, you know. But, it’s, it’s just you could just mostly feel when you’re that deep. Now, some of them rigged them up a light, put on their head and they dove with lights.
PH: Un- huh
TL: But I never did.
PH: You didn’t, you didn’t use a light?
TL: Unh- uh, never did use a light. Never did use a wet suit, I used a dry suit, semi
PH: Yeah, oh my goodness. So did you dive all year around or just summer.
TL: Un- huh, yeah
PH: All year
TL: Yeah. Dove in the winter, yeah. In fact the way it was split up, I believe I dove, dove two winters mainly. You know, just started in that fall you know.
PH: Yeah.
TL: And then, I don’t remember exactly what time of year it was but I believe it was two winters in there. But I built me, it’s still over in that shed over there, I got a uh, uh top built for my boat out of Plexiglas to set on top of my boat in the winter time. And I’d come up in it and I’d have to open the door, it would get so hot in there. Didn’t even have to have a heater with that Plexiglas.
PH: Oh, my goodness.
TL: The sun shining through it, you know, and keep it warm. But I really did enjoy it. It’s, I made, made a pretty good living at it what time I did do it, you know.
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