The Boy Who Was Swallowed By A Whale At The Jersey Shore

He was scared and he was crying; blubbering in the blubber — so to speak !

It was 10:00 on a winter morning when we heard it. My father was driving his van full of Saturday campers to the Shore Rollerdrom for their morning skate. I was riding shotgun as Dad’s trusty 13 year old counselor. We checked with the kids and they heard it too. Three short blasts on the firehouse siren, repeated 3 times.

“You heard it kids?”my father asked. “Was it was 3?” Checking with me. “Yeah, Dad, I think it was 3!” Silently, we were all praying that the firehouse blasts were in bursts of 3.

In that period of Jersey Shore history if the firehouse siren gave 3 short bleats , it was no ordinary fire. To announce that someone’s house was burning or some other incendiary issue the siren gave only one contiguous 10 second bleat, pause, then another. This went on for a full minute. No sir, this was no ordinary fire. Three short bursts on the siren 3 times in a row (then nothing) meant that a whale that had washed up on the beach in our small Central Jersey town. In almost all cases, the whale would be long dead — and smelly.

My father did a U turn on Rt35 and headed toward the beach area. No indoor roller skating this Saturday, we had “bigger fish to fry!” (not to mention it would save Dad about $15…