Some Observations from the Hill by H. H. "Hub" Brown

One year when Ag and I went to Sebastion, Florida, expecting to find a cabin or a place with housekeeping facilities at the Palmers Motel where we had stayed before. But, some unexpected relatives from Maryland had come to visit and there was no vacancy. But John, the husband of the lady that ran the motel, had met a couple that had just recently bought a house right on the Indian River that had an unusual room that could we have for $55 a week. As this was quite a lot cheaper than anything we had heard of we were curious.

It seems that some years previous to this, a middle aged man who was a big wig in the Bethlehem Steel Company had bought quite a tract of land on some higher ground just outside the city limits, had it surveyed into lots, built streets and sidewalks and then had given it to the city. Sebastion wasn't much of a city, but when he had sold all those lots he felt that it would be. But years later not many people had built there.

In lots of places the vine that makes up lots of the lawns in Florida had grown across the sidewalks and into the streets. Here and there a house would be built and then shortly one would be built on each side of it where some one from the North had bought and built and then persuaded a couple relatives or neighbors to join him. We haven't been back there for quite some time but must be a good many lots have been sold for the last time we visited there on the autotrain, the big chains were putting up huge stores.

This Steel Co. man had had two-foot I-beams laid, put down to make air space under his house. It was built on a three-acre lot that had a canal on one side and the entrance to a boat yard on the other. There was a concrete seawall across the front facing the water. Besides his living rooms there were two rooms on each side of the main house so the couple that had bought the place could rent two of these by the week and the other two were rented by two salesmen who left Friday morning for work and didn't come back till Monday evening. They had an agreement with these men and could rent their rooms four days.

There had been a conference room built that was 42' by 42' with a small bar and small kitchen which could be shut off from the big room with folding doors. There was a good sized, screened in pool. It was said that a tilesetter had lived and worked there almost a year while they were building the house. There were pictures all over the insides of the pool and the walls around it.

This conference room was where we stayed for five weeks and both our son Jim and daughter Norma brought their families down and stayed with us. Their rooms were more expensive than ours, but I don't know much.

There was good fishing in both canals and when it was windy we could fish in the boat yard. Our grandson Kevin, even was able to troll by walking the seawall. Other fish used that wall as a place to drive small fish to and then when they were confused would chop them up. Some times I would see a dolphin or two 50 or 60 yards out, and the next instant they would be catching fish right by me.
 

In my account last month of our fishing out on the ocean about Buck being worried about the wind picking up when he had his 87-year-old father and the old man being worried about his son wanting to head for shore. The old man said "Buck, I think its Cammin right down, don't you?" Meaning he wanted Buck to think the weather was getting calmer. Somehow the old man was misquoted and the way it came out made no sense.