A Tale of Turtles and Stocks

As a child growing up in a solidly middle class neighborhood of Baton Rouge, La. that was sheltered by trees that were and still are, so majestically tall, I lived the idyllic life.

Part of my idyllic life was the large lake only one block from my home where I was fortunate enough to always have some kind of small wooden boat with a small outboard motor with the latest I had there being a five horsepower Royal outboard. I knew every inch and cranny of that lake where I also learned to swim, fish and catch turtles.

When the weather hit 75 degrees in the spring, then off would come my shoes and would not be put on again until the Fall when weather hit below 75. Even went to school barefooted. By the time Fall rolled around my soles were like hard leather and I could run on a gravel road. Re-adjusting to shoes was awful.

Springtime was when the baby turtles were hatched and proliferated. That's when I went into action catching five basic types of turtles. They were:

Greenback---about the size of a half dollar with a solid green back and red ears.
Chinese---about the same size but had a variegated yellow and green color.
Brownback--same size but had a light brown back with a sharply raised serrated black ridge running the length of his shell.
Japanese---smaller than the above about the size of a quarter. It had nearly a black shell with an orange reddish streak running down the length of it's shell.
Softshell---sandy colored and bigger and wider and did have a soft pliable shell.

There were several kids in the neighborhood that caught them and all of us kept them in large metal tubs with sand and water. There was plenty of active trading going on. Naturally, the rarer the turtle the more value it had.

Greenbacks were the most plentiful.
Chinese less and a Chinese could be traded for as much as five Greenbacks.
Brownbacks could be traded for as much as five to ten Chinese
and Japanese were the summa bonum.

The most rare and you practically had to acquire one by giving away all of your collection of a hundred or more to get one. I've probably never caught more than about five in all those years. When you had one, you didn't leave it outside in your tub. Likewise with the Brownbacks. You kept it inside your home for fear there would be late night raids on your turtle tubs. There were plenty and I raided a few myself. It was a dog eat dogsituation in the Turtle world.

Post Cereal began putting a coupon on their cereal boxes that stated cut out the coupon and send it inalong with twenty five cents and they would send you a turtle.

The guy working for Post Cereal would come by every Friday and I would sell him only Greenbacks for a nickel each. Pretty good money for a 11 year old. Post must have had many guys scouring all over Louisiana for those Greenbacks. I believe they had that ad program only a short time as they could not get enough turtles.

I kinda made up for this financial loss by selling turtles at schools to Sissies whose mommy's would not dare let their little Johnnys get near the lake. I would come to school with ten or more turtles stuffed in my pants pockets and would have them sold before class started or at least by first recess.

That's where I began to learn about the stockmarket due to the analogy between trading for stocks or turtles.

Money chasing a certain stock drives it up in value and Greenbacks chasing Japanese drove them up in value. Altho' it not exactly analogous due to the scarcity factor in trading turtles, they are similar situations.

The softshell was really not worth much unless it was at least 12 inches across, then I would sell it for a quarteror so to local black people who consider it a favorite delicacy.

On nostalgic moments such as when I'm writing this, I can still conjure up the fecund smell of that lake as if I were a little kid again. The water was a dirty unclear brown. It was loaded with E-Coli bacteria as sewage ran right into it. I swam all over that lake and never got sick. Imagine that happening to some kid today. I recall that there were only a couple of us that swam in it.

I've read about people catching Salmonella from turtles. I must have put hundreds of Greenbacks in my closed mouth and then opening my mouth to shock the girls at school. I never got Salmonella.

There was an island in the lake about fifty years wide. I would take my boat out there at ten years old and pitch a tent and spend the night. My parents were lenient to say the least. From the time that I remembered, I came and went wheneverI wanted to and don't really recall them putting any limitations on me. I suppose they were to involved in their maritalbattle to worry about me.

I've stopped by in the old neighborhood many times over the years and was tempted to go buy a dipnet and catch some turtles. I've asked people in the neighborhood whether or not kids do that anymore and they don't. I feel sorry for them.