Summary: | Interview with Soper on the history of the fishery in Quidi Vidi, as well as information about his fishing stage and specific stories about his life experiences. Introductions; Worked cutting out cod tongues age 7; Jobs processing cod; Learning from Mallard; Earning $1.27 per hour; Grandmother had store; 2:20 - Life as a child; No running water; Good life; 3:00 - Grandfathers built house; Relation to Snow family; Cod liver oil plant; 3:40 - Had a pig farm; 4:30 - Sense of community; Family names; Father from Battery; Father worked with Hydro; Died in fire at 51; 6:00 - Parents divorced; 6:45 - Mike and Frankie Mallard cut fish; Splitting gutting vs. filleting; 8:00 - Splitting and drying techniques; Salt fish; 8:20 - Animals and cost of feeding livestock; 9:40 - Being an only child; 10:20 - Father moving from the Battery; Eli Tucker as boat builder; Information about Tucker crew; Boarding house on Brazil’s Square; 12:00 - Trap skiffs and landing over 1 million pounds; Hired and boarded in the Tucker premises; Worked 16 hr days, 6 days a week; 13:30 - Strong as a young man; Skepticism of fishery; 14:40 - Picking berries and playing games; Mischief as child; 15:30 - Different in Quidi Vidi now; Traditional skills disappearing; Knitting; Net mending; 16:30 - Information about children; Technology; Animals and hunting; 18:20 - New Year’s tradition of shooting guns; 18:40 - Christmas traditions; Boxing day visiting to see Christmas trees; Mummers; 19:45 - Learn one thing a day philosophy; 20:15 - Story about young girl camping out; Stage and family property; 24:00 - Selling stage; 24:30 - Loss of son by drowning; Boat “Ryan and the Crew”; 26:00 - Information about his stage; Designed and built pounds; Memorable storms; Polar bear story; 29:40 - Basking shark story; Liver oil; Blue sharks; 31:40 - Seal as meat; 32:00 - Puffins plentiful; Different bird eggs; 34:00 - Lived with mother and her husband; Looked after mother; Community names; 35:40 - Soper born Jan. 28, 1955; QV was his mother’s home; Reflecting on ...
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