My sister, Linda Rosen, has written about our father, Harry Schoenfeld, who was born in 1919, and lived on a farm in Watertown, Wisconsin in his early years. As my father’s favorite son, I write about his greatest love outside of his family - - fishing with, of course, his favorite son.

But before the fishing there was a most important detail that had to be accounted for - - namely; making sure that there were the right fishing lures to attract those wily bass, perch and walleye.

After all these years, it is still hard for me to reconcile how the fish, who should have been so completely captivated by the lures that my father accumulated in his battle to dominate them, could have possibly resisted any one of his unlimited lures. But, as hard as my father tried, year-after-year-after-year, the fish grew larger and larger, as my father grew more and more frustrated.

Dad would say: “Howie, I just can’t understand it. Look at the action on this lure.”

“How can they resist?”

But resist they did! Dad would then go back to the sporting goods store and buy even more lures in his never-ending quest to catch that ever and always elusive “trophy.”

So, after all these years, as I think about the wonderful days that we spent together on a pristine lake, with a gentle breeze and a never-ending hope of bringing in that trophy fish, I can only conclude that some power, far beyond anything we could recognize or understand, had brought us together in a unique and special way.

– Howard Schoenfeld

Relationship:  Grandchild of im/migrant Grandchild of im/migrant