A portrait of the Glouchester fishermen made famous in "The Perfect Storm." This powerful work brings the reader along with the fishermen as they plow the treacherous sea in search of the elusive and dwindling schools of fish. Kim Bartlett lets us hear the men speak and puts readers right on the boat with them. 14 photos.

Since their founding in 1969, the Gloucester Fishermen's Wives Association has been a powerful force for the conservation of New England's precious fishing grounds and heritage. The "Fishermen's Wives" are consummate cooks as well as dedicated activists. This book celebrates their cuisine and politics. Read the stories of cooking, courage, and love; savor the photographs, and feast on the foods that have nurtured Gloucester's seafaring families for generations, with 173 of the members' traditional European and American recipes for seafood and a variety of other appetizers, entrees and desserts. The Fishermen's Wives have helped improve safety standards on U.S. vessels, created the first subsidized health plan for fishermen, established a marine sanctuary at Stellwagen Bank, and have helped to protect the health of the ocean and the future of the fishing industry. The GFWA erected the statue that now overlooks Gloucester Harbor honoring the "faith, diligence, and fortitude" of all fishermen's wives, qualities that arise in part from their strong Sicilian-American, Portuguese, Irish, and Newfoundland cultural traditions. A portion of every book sold goes to the Gloucester Fishermen's Wives Association to fund their efforts towards the conservation of New England's fishing grounds and improvement of conditions for fishermen and their families.

A true story of men against the sea.

Since the Viking ascendancy in the Middle Ages, the Atlantic has shaped the lives of people who depend upon it for survival. And just as surely, people have shaped the Atlantic. In his innovative account of this interdependency, W. Jeffrey Bolster, a historian and professional seafarer, takes us through a millennium-long environmental history of our impact on one of the largest ecosystems in the world. While overfishing is often thought of as a contemporary problem, Bolster reveals that humans were transforming the sea long before factory trawlers turned fishing from a handliner's art into an industrial enterprise. The western Atlantic's legendary fishing banks, stretching from Cape Cod to Newfoundland, have attracted fishermen for more than five hundred years. Bolster follows the effects of this siren's song from its medieval European origins to the advent of industrialized fishing in American waters at the beginning of the twentieth century. Blending marine biology, ecological insight, and a remarkable cast of characters, from notable explorers to scientists to an army of unknown fishermen, Bolster tells a story that is both ecological and human: the prelude to an environmental disaster. Over generations, harvesters created a quiet catastrophe as the sea could no longer renew itself. Bolster writes in the hope that the intimate relationship humans have long had with the ocean, and the species that live within it, can be restored for future generations.

With over seventy photographs and maps, an extensive glossary of fishing terms, and a detailed chronology of the Gloucester fleet, including all the fishermen and vessels lost at sea since 1693, 'Alone at Sea' is a comprehensive record of life in the area.

Like countless Gloucester fishermen before and since, Howard Blackburn and Tom Welch were trawling for halibut on the Newfoundland banks in an open dory in 1883 when a sudden blizzard separated them from their mother ship. Alone on the empty North Atlantic, they battled towering waves and frozen spray to stay afloat. Welch soon succumbed to exposure, and Blackburn did the only thing he could: He rowed for shore. He rowed five days without food or water, with his hands frozen to the oars, to reach the coast of Newfoundland. Yet his tests had only begun. So begins Joe Garland’s extraordinary account of the hero fisherman of Gloucester. Incredibly, though Blackburn lost his fingers to his icy misadventure, he went on to set a record for swiftest solo sailing voyage across the Atlantic that stood for decades. Lone Voyager is a Homeric saga of survival at sea and a thrilling portrait of the world’s most fabled fishing port in the age of sail.—Print Ed.