Prior to World War Two, Uncle Cy was raising a family and he lived under The Arches at Newport Beach, California in a little old wooden house. The Arches was a bridge allowing traffic to pass over the Coast Highway on the way to Balboa from Costa Mesa. Cy could see the Newport Harbor from his door. It was a short walk to the dock where he was the captain of a powerful sports-fishing boat named The Blue Water. Cy and Uncle Clyde who lived nearby did commercial fishing for mackerel, white sea bass and other salt water fish.
When marlin sword fish were running, Uncle Cy took people thirty miles out to sea near Catalina Island where he had unusual good luck. Aunt Audrey went with him on the charters and sometimes they brought their two children Vonnie and Little Cy whom we called Billy. Uncle Cy took his party of one or two fishermen out at night. When they reached the blue water Uncle Cy raised a white canvas like a sail and had a light shine on it. Flying fish would jump out of the water and crash into the canvas where they were gathered to be used as bait for marlin. Audrey fed ice cold cokes to the fishermen as they sat strapped to a chair fighting marlin sometimes for hours. It was hot in the sun and the drinks tasted good. Cy tied flying fish to a big hook for bait. He instructed the clients how to to fish for marlin. He said. "First the marlin slaps his bill down hard on the bait in an effort to stun it. Then the sword fish turns the flying fish so it will easily slide down his throat. While this is going on you let the line be slack and allow the marlin to run with the bait. After giving enough time for the bait to be swallowed, set the hook by locking the reel lever and heaving back hard with the pole. Keep the pole tip high with tention on the line." In 1940 the Newport Beach Chamber of Commerce gave Cy a plaque for having a perfect record of catching marlin on every trip.
Sometimes the Coast Guard contacted The Blue Water for help on rescue missions because it was a powerful boat. The Coast Guard knew Clyde Smith and Cy Jones enjoyed the dangerous adventures they were sure to have on stormy seas. Uncle Clyde explained to me, "Sometimes we were called in the middle of the night during a storm at sea. When we headed out through the break-water we headed at an angle toward the rock jetty on the right of us. Strong waves, wind, and current kept pushing us to the left toward the other jetty at Corona Del Mar. We made our way out past the jetties to the big clanking bell. The bell was ringing like mad in the storm half a mile past the end of the jetties. We usually found a boat waiting, not able to come into the harbor because it lacked the power necessary for a safe entry. We cast a heavy tow rope to the boat and pulled it toward shore in the darkness. Sometimes the waves were so large they crashed over the Newport jetty, and some waves swept across the water and over the other jetty at Corona Del Mar. Our strong engine was the only thing that saved us. Going back toward shore we headed at an angle just missing the tip of the rocks on the south jetty and chugged full speed toward the Newport side. It looked like we were going to run into the rocks but waves washed over the Newport jetty, picked up our boats and carried us back sideways hundreds of yards and set us down dangerously close to the rocks of Corona Del Mar behind us. We kept on slicing our way in and praying the motor wouldn't stall. If it had stalled we would have been smashed on the rocks. We wouldn't have had a chance."
When not fishing Uncle Cy often worked on a drag line. A drag line is a large tractor with a mechanical arm that digs trenches for large underground pipes. Cy dug ditches along the Coast Highway at Newport beach and helped lay the sewer pipes. He enjoyed operating the large digger and the pay was good, but he eventually became bored with it. Cy worked as a salesman, a cement contractor, a shoe cobbler, an auctioneer, and fruit picker. He was a foreman at the ship yards where they built ships, and he had many other jobs including bailing hay and herding cattle. He usually dressed like a cowboy.
He told me how he worked in the depression. He said, "I saw men working at an orange packing house in Anaheim loading heavy boxes onto a freight car. This was in 1935, the early part of the great depression when men worked in California for a dollar a day. They were desperate for work, and men fought each other over jobs. I asked the foreman for a job and was refused. I jumped up on the freight car and worked anyway. Later the foreman paid me saying, 'Anyone who wants to work that bad deserves a job.'"
(I remember hearing gunfire behind our house in Anaheim where men picked oranges in a small grove and fought each other for the right to pick.)
Uncle Cy liked to trade things. He traded his cars so often you couldn't guess what color he might be driving from week to week. He looked at your feet and if he figured he could fit into your shoes, he asked you to trade with him. He was willing to trade you almost anything. I don't know why unless it was because of his early childhood experience on the Indian reservation.
Cy was the type person who stood out from other men. Although he changed his occupation and moved from town to town, he was often asked to lead the communities by running for office. He was a fast and hard worker with a lively sense of humor who loved to play, hunt and fish. He liked being free and often chose to live in a mobile home. He said he did not wish to own land although he owned several homes. He said, "I have had people offer to give me land free here in California, but I didn't want it. If I had stayed in Oklahoma as Cherokee, I would have owned land reaching as far as the eye can see. Owning land is confining. It keeps you from being free."