Oral History Interview with L. E. Casterline, October 1, 1971 Page: 2
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Casterline
2Stephens:
Casterline:swim, crabs, oysters--all kinds of seafood that we
dealt with. That's where we learned how to open
oysters when we were big enough to pick up an oyster
knife. And before I finished high school, I was able
to open twenty to twenty-five gallons of oysters a
day. At that time, the going price was from fifteen
to twenty-five cents a gallon for the opening. Today,
that same oyster brings you about $2.50 a gallon for
shucking and opening alone.
My goodness. Well, you decided that you wanted to get
into this sort of business even though it's a lot of
hard work. Tell us about the average work day of a
person then comparing it with now, as what sort of
improvements have been made as far as labor is con-
cerned--the hard work involved in the seafood business?
Well, at the time we got into it we headed all, as some
are brought to the dock with their heads on, and they'd
be headed in the processing plant at night. We worked
in head shrimp until twelve or one o'clock in the
morning. We'd ice the boats to get them ready to go back
out the next day and we'd just about meet ourselves going
home on the way back. We'd go home and change clothes
and come back. And we had old boats that . . . well, you
had to put them up on the beach at night to keep them
from sinking. That's in how bad of shape they were.
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Stephens, A. Ray & Casterline, L. E. Oral History Interview with L. E. Casterline, October 1, 1971, book, October 1, 1971; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1529174/m1/4/?q=%221919~%22: accessed July 6, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting UNT Oral History Program.