Roustabout – Bay Marchand, Gulf of Mexico - 1970

Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, a time of fasting and prayer and the day after Shrove Tuesday (Mardi Gras) 1970, I had fifty cents to my name. It was time to seek employment. My hosts, yes I was still freeloading at the same place, suggested Harvey, Louisiana, on the other side of the Mississippi River. “Dude” lent me his VW beetle to drive over. Finding a row of industrial-type business I parked the beetle. Walking down the seedy road, I would stop at prospective businesses and inquire if they had any job openings. One company, “Oil Field Maintenance,” had an employment office. I entered and asked the old fat redneck, at the desk if I could fill out an application. His answer surprised me. “Don’t need no application, name and phone number, I’ll give ya a call.” “Sure you will” I remember thinking, he looked as stingy as his speech and continued my search. I quit about five and went back home, somewhat discouraged but thinking tomorrow is another day.

That night about 8:00PM I received a call from, would you believe it, old fat redneck, “Be at the yard at 6:00AM tomorrow morning.” “Dude” let me drive his car again that day. The yard was right next to the office and I worked until 6PM that day as a welder’s helper. When my shift was over I inquired as to whether I should come again tomorrow. “Ain’t got nothing” said old fat redneck. “But I really could use the work” I pleaded. “Then be back here at 2:30AM,” he conceded. “OK” was my only reply. Now how stupid is that? Not “What’s the job?” or “Why 2:30AM?” just “OK”. “Dude” turned out to be much smarted than I. He said he wasn’t loaning me his car to drive over to Harvey at 2:30AM but since he was a really nice guy, he agreed to drive me over.

There are multitudes of possible scenarios for what might have happened that night; luckily it was an adventure not a disaster. I got out of the car, thanked “Dude” and said I’d give him a call. There were about thirty guys milling around, nobody knew what was going on; we waited about half an hour when three pick up trucks appeared and we climbed in. The trucks took off and we rode for the next two hours through swamps and alligator country until about dawn, when we arrived at a marina. We boarded two cabin cruisers and headed out into the Gulf of Mexico, it was another three hours before we arrived at our final destination, now referred to as the Bay Marchand Fire. Chevron had eleven fires burning on one platform out in the Gulf.

Our base of operations was a barge. On arrival we received our instructions. We were told we needed to be up at 5AM, breakfast at 5:30AM and work started at 6AM. We boarded three tug boats, which is where we were work detailed. For the first few days the tugs would take us to the barge for meals, but this was hazardous as the weather wasn’t always cooperative. The waves could be ten feet high. This meant that as the tug came alongside the barge you had to be very careful you timed your jump from the tug to the barge and vice versa very carefully or you could be one dead roustabout.

On day four we were permanently detailed to the tugs, which meant no more trips to the barge, we would dine onboard our tug. This was our first sign that they were making this up as they went along. Going to the barge had been exciting, Red Adair was there. John Wayne had starred in a movie entitled “Hell Fighters” about the life of Red Adair, so I was impressed. But the tugs were safer and provided less supervision. Life on the tug was fairly laid back. For three for four days it so rough we couldn’t work. I woke up and smelled the bacon from the galley and realized I was seasick, a new experience. It was either work or be seasick. I was out there over two weeks, after believing I was showing up for just another twelve hour work day. I battled seasickness, not having a toothbrush or a change of underwear etc. and chastised myself for stepping into something without having a clue as to what I’d be doing or for how long. On the bright side I had a job, wasn’t working that hard and was getting a lot of overtime.

When we finally got around to the work we were supposed to do, we figured it out as we went along. On board the tug we had 5’x 5’ x 3” heavy foam-filled squares which were chained together and supported by buoyant cylinders on either side, so that about a foot of the foam would stick out of the water. This must have been some experimental Rube Goldberg marketing plan to try out these things. After we located an oil slick we would toss them off the stern of the tug into the water until we had about two hundred yards trailing after us then the tug would try to encircle the slick. This is the theory anyway. Once the oil slick was encircled another device was brought up which would supposedly suck up the oil. We could have picked up more oil with a turkey baster. When we pulled the contraptions out of the water they were covered in oil, which soaked into our clothes, and shoes.

Once it became obviously to everyone that this particular product was a waste of time we were released and taken back to the Oil Field Maintenance office. Our job was done. In a little over two weeks I’d earned $600 plus, a small fortune for me at that time. Upon returning to “Dude’s” and reassessing my situation, it became clear that they didn’t need a third roommate. On a Tulane bulletin board I found a posting for “Roommate Wanted”. It was a four bedroom house in a nice neighborhood shared by three Tulane students. My rent was $50/month, they were nice guys and I moved in. I bought a Chevy Corvair for $100 which promptly broke down and spent another month or so in New Orleans before getting a call from my mother pleading with me to return home. Being a dutiful son I complied and bought a one way stand-by air-fare back to Indianapolis. I could have had a life in New Orleans; things were beginning to jell, another crossroad.