University of Chicago Press
The Western Flyer: Steinbeck's Boat, the Sea of Cortez, and the Saga of Pacific Fisheries
Key Metrics
- Kevin M Bailey
- University of Chicago Press
- Hardcover
- 9780226116761
- 8.6 X 5.5 X 0.9 inches
- 0.7 pounds
- Nature > Ecosystems & Habitats - Oceans & Seas
- English
Secure TransactionBook Description
In this book, Kevin M. Bailey resurrects this forgotten witness to the changing tides of Pacific fisheries. He draws on the Steinbeck archives, interviews with family members of crew, and more than three decades of working in Pacific Northwest fisheries to trace the depletion of marine life through the voyages of a single ship. After Steinbeck and his friend Ed Ricketts--a pioneer in the study of the West Coast's diverse sea life and the inspiration behind Doc in Cannery Row--chartered the boat for their now-famous 1940 expedition, the Western Flyer returned to its life as a sardine seiner in California. But when the sardine fishery in Monterey collapsed, the boat moved on: fishing for Pacific ocean perch off Washington, king crab in the Bering Sea off Alaska, and finally wild Pacific salmon--all industries that would also face collapse.
As the Western Flyer herself faces an uncertain future--a businessman has bought her, intending to bring the boat to Salinas, California, and turn it into a restaurant feature just blocks from Steinbeck's grave--debates about the status of the California sardine, and of West Coast fisheries generally, have resurfaced. A compelling and timely tale of a boat and the people it carried, of fisheries exploited, and of fortunes won and lost, The Western Flyer is environmental history at its best: a journey through time and across the sea, charting the ebb and flow of the cobalt waters of the Pacific coast.
Author Bio
Kevin McLean Bailey started his career as a marine fisheries biologist and ecologist in 1974 after graduating from the University of California at Santa Barbara. His first assignment was on a Japanese crab fishing ship in the eastern Bering Sea for 4 months taking biological measurements on the catch, and then on a pollock factory trawler in the Bering Sea. He later earned his PhD from the University of Washington.
He attained a Senior Scientist level at the Alaska Fisheries Science Center, where he published over 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals and books. He is an Affiliate Professor at the University of Washington and in 2008 was awarded the Sette Award for outstanding lifetime achievement in marine fisheries by the American Fisheries Society.
He left NOAA in 2013 to write full time. His wife is an oceanographer at the Polar Science Center at the University of Washington and Institute for Systems Biology and they have two grown, happy and successful boys and two delightful grandchildren.
Source: kevinmbailey.com
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