Cruiseport Construction Update 6/27/08, originally uploaded by captjoe06.
Cruiseport Construction Update 6/27/08
My View of Life on the Dock
My View of Life on the Dock
Cruiseport Construction Update 6/27/08, originally uploaded by captjoe06.
Good Morning Gloucester 
Joe, have you read Mark Kurlansky’s The Last Fish Tale: The Fate of the Atlantic and Survival in Gloucester, America’s Oldest Fishing Port and Most Original Town? I finished it yesterday and posted my review to Amazon. I’ll get ti on my blog next week.
I think you would like it — especially the last part about the future of Gloucester. he has some interesting comparison’s and observations.
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According to a couple of fishermen I spoke with they said the book is sensationalized.
Honestly I don’t have any interest in reading about the fishing industry from a guy that doesn’t work in it.
There’s so much bullshit that gets thrown around by outsiders who really don’t and never will know what’s going on inside the industry that it’s hard for me to take any of them seriously.
There are some celebrated local authors that I find absolutely ridiculous and when you talk to the old timers that actually fished in the days that he writes about, they will tell you how full of shit he is. The old timers will tell you if they trust you that he tries to pass himself off as an authoritarian on certain fishing industry subjects when the old timers that were actually working on boats and buying and selling the fish laugh at the so called “authoritarian”.
One such old timer put it best when he said something to the effect- “#@& #@&!@^*, I’ve wrung more salt water out of my socks than you’ve sailed over.”
That’s not a slam on Kurlanski. Maybe his book is the exception. I just don’t feel the need to read someone’s account of it that may have done studies on it for a year or two when I’ve spent a lifetime on the dock seeing what really goes on.
Get a book authored by Mark or Tom Ring, Manny Porter, Carlo Moceri, Tony Marquis, Tom Malloy, Gus Ciulla, Louie Williams, Frank Rose, or Busty Brancleone and you’ll get a book I’d pay good money to read because you would get the real deal. Not a book by a half assed fisherman that hardly ever worked or a guy that never earned a dime on the waterfront but pass themselves off as the real deal.
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Well, I think you may have the wrong impression of what the book is about. The first half of the book is about the history of Gloucester and includes some interesting anecdotes and interviews with local people — most of whom I know. And some pretty good recipes. He also covers the development of the art community and the influx of writes to the area. I found those chapters interesting though he just touches on the highlights — but if he went into depth on everything the book would be 1000 pages long.
What I found most interesting and also most encouraging were the last two chapters in which he gave profiles of several other fishing communities — in England, France and the Basque region along the Spanish border — and how they are attempting to adapt to the economic demands of the present without destroying their harbors and stripping their fishermen of a way of life.
If you read it purely from the perspective of what he has to say about fishing itself you are probably correct in saying there are people around here who could do a better job. But I found his profiles of other fishing ports meeting the same challenges and how they dealt with it to be enlightening. Whenever people around here talk about the future of Gloucester they always say “We don’t want to turn into another Newport or Marblehead” but they never say what we DO want to turn into. I think Kurlansky presents some possibilities that could be good models that both the fishermen and the business community could appreciate.
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Well, based on your recommendation(which I highly regard), I may have to give an exception to my rule about outsiders writing about the fishing industry and give it a shot next winter.
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Thank you! That’s very nice of you to say.
Even if you don’t read the whole book it is worth it to read the last 2 chapters. I’ll drop my coffee off to you if you want…
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I meant to say I’ll drop my “Copy” off — not my “coffee” —- geez, you can tell where my mind was this morning!
I just saw Marilyn Swift in the market and she said Kurlansky will be back for a couple months this summer to research a book he is planning on Clarence Birdseye. She said he loves Gloucester so much he keeps finding reasons to come here and do research.
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