Daring Young Man Dives off the Carolina
All three of the Hardin boys ? Adlai, Parker, and Marty ? were of college age during the middle 20s, and were going to schools in the east. Whenever possible, they made the long journey west to Door County to spend as much of the summer as they could at their family summer place, The Forest of Hardin. Their home was hidden up a winding lane deep in the woods at the top of a cliff. All the boys were fine swimmers and divers, and they wore black college sweaters with class numerals of orange across the front that they had won by being on their college swim teams. Tacked on the wall in the living room of their cottage, the boys had a display of little blue felt pennants with a white ?E? on them, showing the many successes they had had while competing in the swimming and diving events of the Ephraim regattas.If you consider the swimming and diving abilities of the three Hardin Boys combined with their propensity to inventive pranks and lively mischief, it should come as no surprise that something out of the usual would happen occasionally. Captain McGarity, the master of the Carolina, became involved in a battle of wits with the Hardin boys, a battle which he was bound to long remember.One day as the majestic Carolina ended her Ephraim stay and started backing into the bay, one of the Hardin boys appeared on the boat?s top deck in his swimming suit. Somehow he had managed to climb the aft stair case from the cabin deck, unnoticed, and was now among the covered lifeboats. He stood at the edge of the deck where there was no protective railing between lifeboats, directly above the aft cargo door opening. Word about what was going to happen had circulated among the dock crowd, and all waited with anticipation as the boat cleared the end of the dock. Lifting his arms over his head, and with toes gripping the edge of the deck, Parker (or was it Adlai?) prepared to dive from the top of the ship. The dive was a ?jack-knife? so we knew it was Adlai, for parker would have done a ?swan? dive.Captain McGarity saw it from the end of the flying bridge. He grasped the rail to lean far out and watch with complete disbelief. His concern seemed to lessen only slightly as he saw the lad was clear of the boat, but his relief was momentary and quickly replaced with a burst of Irish anger. He was master of the ship responsible for what happened to her; such things as this must not happen. He knew the Goodrich Company wasn?t paying him the princely sum of $250 a month to manage their property in this way.This story is taken from the book Did the Eagle Get You, Dr. Moss? by Charles Fredrick Wiley.
