Memories of … The ‘Crick’ in the Valley

Those sneakers were fresh off the shelf at Pic-Way, but they didn’t stand a chance against the orange coal-mine water running beneath Bethany Pike. The good news was a new pair was purchased the next day and a pair of “crick shoes” was kept in the basement.

That’s right, crick. Out the crick. Float the crick. Fish the crick.

And fishing has been what kids in the Upper Ohio Valley have done the most in Ohio and Belmont counties along and in Wheeling Creek. Most of the time the poles were basement relics, but hooks were cheap, and the dough ball from the Pizza Inn on Washington Avenue was maybe a dime depending on the manager on duty. And then it was under the Washington Avenue Bridge or beneath the walking bridge that connected Locust Avenue with Wheeling College’s campus.

If Pizza Inn didn’t have the bait, big rocks were lifted, and crawdads were collected. What ended up on those hooks usually depended on the bait, too, because the dough attracted carp and catfish, but those mini lobsters brought in the bass. It was always catch and release, though, and if the fish weren’t biting, the attention turned to those rock-skip contests and treasure hunting for beer can collections.

Of course, there was one day when tunneling under Wheeling Creek was thought to be a plausible venture and after some boyhood calculations, the digging began on the north shoreline in Fulton. The crick was low that day, so three feet seemed deep enough. Well, it wasn’t, and referring to the kids as “muddy” doesn’t do it justice.

September 2004

It doesn’t matter what crick in the Valley is your favorite because they all flooded when 10 inches of rain fell on the region in just 10 hours on Sept. 17, 2004. A few days later, the Ohio River ran over her banks throughout the Upper Ohio Valley, and FEMA and the Red Cross quickly responded and remained in place for weeks.

The first flooding reports in Wheeling came from residents in Elm Grove, who reported automobiles were floating downstream after a bank caved in along the area of the Elm Grove Crossing Mall. Residents of Dimmeydale and Pleasanton were next, and the troubles continued to the confluence with the Ohio River next Wesbanco Arena. Children attending Middle Creek Elementary were forced to climb a hill to waiting school buses on Interstate 70, and by 5 p.m. most roadways in Ohio County were impassable.

The same was true in Belmont County with areas such as Neffs, where the waters pushed houses from their foundations; U.S. 40 became covered with flood waters in several areas, and Perkins Field in Bridgeport looked like a lake.

A ‘Crick’ Kid

These days, if the flow is deep enough, more people kayak than canoe, and it’s mostly adults seen fishing on the banks. Children today are seldom seen with poles and seining nets (that’s what is used to catch those crawdads!) and that’s because of a different parenting mindset from what was in place 40 years ago.

Back then, though, growing up a “crick” kid was relatively normal because it was an honest source of entertainment. The only parenting was making sure the children always were wearing those sneakers because moms and dads were aware, of how the waterway was treated (abused) by local industry. In other words, one never knew what could be found that thankfully wasn’t stepped on with bare feet.

The children of the 1970s-’80s jumped off walls and went airborne from tire swings. The submerged rocks were always slippery, and the ducks always were hungry and kind of nasty about it. Lunch depended on what part of the crick was chosen; if it was Elm Grove, Farm Fresh had cheap hoagies; if near Linsly, Burger Chef was key; and when in Fulton, George’s Bar had 25-cent mashed potatoes and burgers for a buck.

And if you were lucky, your parents had friends who leased a crick camp along Big Wheeling Creek Road, and they invited the family out for a Labor Day picnic. It would be a day that began in the morning with fishing that would turn into swimming, then following a hot dog lunch and a cheeseburger dinner, the firecrackers would pop, and the bottle rockets would fly during that final evening before the beginning of the school year.