The first gill net fishing boats were wide-beamed, double-ended skiffs, from 18 to 26 feet long, equipped with oars, a sprit sail, and a small drum at the stern for winding the gill net. Sometimes a tent draped over a pole at the bow and attached to the mast gave a litle shelter. Gillnetters usually had a crew of two. While one man rowed, the other set the net, playing it out at right angles to the flow of the current. They worked from Sunday, when the cannery company’s boat towed the fleet of skiffs to the fishing grounds, to 6 o’clock on Friday, when the procedure was reversed. Each day, packers collected the catch and took it to the cannery for processing.

Life aboard gillnetters was spartan:

Our living facilities were rather rough in those old-time boats. The sleeping quarters were simply a couple of blankets on the hard bare board on which we lay, crouched under the foc’sle head which was not long enough to cover our entire body, thus leaving our legs exposed, over which we spread our yellow oilskin raincoat. Our cooking was done on a five-gallon coal oil can which was cut down to form a crude stove in which we used wood for fuel. Our lavatory? Well, we sat over the boat side. In rough weather we tied ourselves to the mast to avoid being washed overboard