Lawrence Sargent Hall "The Ledge" 1960

In Lawrence Sargent Hall's "The Ledge," the story centers around a gruff fisherman.  Hall's biography connects to this story at every angle.  Hall lived on the ocean.  Hall's writings are concerned with people acting under pressure.  The fisherman in "The Ledge" is very skilled at pressure situations, he relies on his planning and his ownership of lifelong knowledge and the best fishing/hunting equipment money can buy.  The fisherman's planning is so flawless that when he discovers he has left his tobacco at home he is floored, this man is not used to making mistakes.  The main character even though designed by Hall to have very limited interpersonal relationship skills shows a sign of warmth by taking his son and his nephew duck hunting on Christmas with new shotguns he had bought for them.  The day implodes on the three when while docked on a ledge, which is submerged when the tide is high, and their skiff floats away.  Leaving the three surrounded by freezing water and the thought of rapidly rising water levels.  The fisherman keeps his composure and tries without success to get rescued but slowly the three all lose their lives.  This fisherman I consider a "John Wayne" type was a man that was tough, ornery, and loyal.  This story written in 1960 shows the newer more dark realism that happened after America had time to process atrocities that had happened in the war and a sense of fear that is brought forward by artists.