(Radio Iowa) – An Iowa-based author, folklorist and photographer is releasing a new book that chronicles life on the Mississippi River during the 20th century though the words of a commercial fisherman. Sherry Pardee, of Iowa City, says “Back Them Days – Reflections on a Life on the Mississippi River” tells the story of the late Clinton “Bus” Downs, who lived in the tiny river town of Meyer on the western-most tip of Illinois, and his life revolved around the river.

Pardee says, “Bus was one of those special people that you meet in life that you realize, this is an exemplary human being, and someone who’s just lived honorably, lived well, and just has done amazing things with their life in a way beyond what normal people do.” Bus was a third-generation fisherman, born in 1915. As a boy, he was nicknamed Buster, which was shortened to Bus, and that’s the name everyone knew him by. Pardee says she’s spoken with fishermen “way up north on the Mississippi” who know of Bus, respected him, and consider him a legend.

“He was almost like a Daniel Boone figure,” Pardee says. “He would trap and hunt with his father when they weren’t fishing. He and his father would trap and hunt from Canada all the way down to Mississippi, way beyond what the normal fisherman or hunter would do.” Pardee first met Bus in the summer of 1987, when the Illinois Arts Council hired her to survey traditions of commercial fishermen on the Upper Mississippi, and she repeatedly returned over the next four years to record his fascinating stories. “Back Them Days” is largely told in Bus’ own words. “Bus had a great sense of humor,” she says, “was very philosophical, tells great stories of big hauls of fish, game wardens, floods, people that were traveling up and down the river, stories of giant catfish.”

Pardee’s black-and-white photographs add a timeless element to the pages. In the 1930s, prior to the locks and dams on the Mississippi, Bus told how the river was about 100 feet deep, while often now it’s only about six feet deep. Over the decades, Bus witnessed the pollution caused by chemical runoff from farms, and how the fish population fell. He moved to Quincy, Illinois, after the flood of 1993 devastated Meyer, and died in the Quincy Veterans Home in 2008.