On more than one occasion I have advocated for state residents to subscribe to the free Missouri Conservationist magazine. Its spectacular photography and stories about the outdoors and wildlife are a true treasure.
I know that I have been a fan of the magazine for as long as I can remember, and even longer than that apparently, because I learned recently that my Uncle Richard Starke was featured in the pages of the September 1967 copy. I wasn’t old enough to read the articles, but I’m certain someone showed me the pictures.
The story—titled “The Vanishing Breed”—never mentioned my uncle specifically, but the four photographs of him and his hoop nets provided great illustrations about the work of a commercial fisherman. I could almost see myself trailing behind him as he walked down the ramp to his flat-bottom john boat and 40-horse Evinrude.
My neighbor Mel Ott also was a commercial fisherman. He plied the trade setting trotlines on summer weekends with 500 baited hooks below the Alton Dam on the Mississippi River. Uncle Richard ran his nets daily in the Missouri River upstream from Hermann. What great fortune it was to have been a kid in their boats multiple times.
The article from 1967 mentioned the decline in the number of anglers who caught fish to sell. Uncle Richard offered his live or dressed for people who came to his docks on the Gasconade River. Mel sold his to a fish market in the St. Louis area, and a list of regular customers who were anxious for fresh catfish.
According to data from 1945 when the state Department of Conservation started compiling the information, 1,210 commercial fishermen caught a million pounds of fish from the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. By 1965 the number of permits had dropped to 751 and their take was down to 279,000 pounds of fish.
“In 21 years, the number of fishermen using these two rivers has declined about one-third while the pounds of fish harvested has declined nearly three-quarters,” the article by state fisheries biologist John W. Robinson reported.
My conservation department go-to guy Joe Jerek, news services coordinator, said the state issued 157 permits this year for resident and non-resident commercial fishing.
I can attest to the story’s claim that commercial fishing is hard work. I was much more of an observer than a participant in the labor, but I can tell you what a marvel it was to watch those big nets come into a small boat while the muddy current pressed on the aluminum hull.
The story mostly focused on the pollution and channelization that brought steep drops in the numbers and size of fish available on the state’s two big rivers. The Missouri River in particular was tamed from a wide and wild stream to a deep canal to enhance industrial transportation.
“This wholesale habitat destruction has resulted in the diking off of chutes, closure of backwater sloughs, exposure of large expanses of barren, shifting sandbars, and a narrower, faster-flowing river,” the article states.
The amount of pollution in the river is likely less than it was in the 1960s. I have a vivid memory of a childhood boat ride on the Missouri River that led to a large pipe spewing a steaming, green stream directly into the river. One of the most surprising elements of the article was the attitude about that sort of dumping.
“There are some professionals in the pollution control field who have stated that the greatest economic value of the Missouri River is for waste disposal,” the story says. “Those of us in the conservation field will, of course, refuse to accept such a thing. It is up to the sanitary engineers to devise modern methods of waste treatment so that all effluents in combination will not adversely affect the river.”
The September 1967 edition marked the 28th year for the Missouri Conservationist magazine and its efforts to educate state residents about the natural world around us. You can find previous issues from as far back as 1995, a link to sign-up for a digital subscription, or request a mailed copy at mdc.mo.gov/conmag.
John Winkelman has been writing about outdoors news and issues in Jefferson County for more than 30 years and was the Associate Editor for Outdoor Guide Magazine.
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