Gloucester's Bargain with the Sea: The Bountiful Maritime Culture of Cape Ann, Massachusetts - Chester Brigham

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Résumé :
In its bargain with the sea Gloucester, Massachusetts accepted devastating losses of men and ships in exchange for prosperity as America's leading fishing port in the late 19th century. An unexpected bonus of the bargain came when the Cape Ann of schooner fishermen was celebrated in words and art by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Henry David Thoreau, Winslow Homer, Rudyard Kipling, T.S. Eliot, Edward Hopper, John Sloan and other leading figures in 19th and 20th century arts and letters. The fisheries are in decline, but the heritage of maritime endeavor and artistic creativity endures.

Biographie:
Writing from his home on Goose Cove in Gloucester, Massachusetts, Chester Brigham begins each book of nonfiction with an individual or an event. Then he pursues significant linkages wherever they may lead. He takes the reader to the Arctic in the 1920's and '30s in the company of legendary Captain Bob Bartlett. To packet ship voyages shuttling between the Cape Verde Islands and New England. To lower Manhattan and East Gloucester with the artistry of John Sloan. To the England of T.S. Eliot with his nostalgia for a boy sailing out of Gloucester harbor to islands down east. To sputtering wood-and-fabric Coast Guard seaplanes winging low along Atlantic shores in pursuit of Prohibition rum runners. Gloucester's maritime and arts history ranges far and wide, and Brigham's books trace the routes to unexpected destinations.