by Lloyd Kitazano (December 2015)

 

 

The MLML Wave logo was undoubtedly inspired by the wood block print titled, The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849). Hokusai created volumes of beautiful and unique drawings and prints over his lifetime, but The Great Wave off Kanagawa (a.k.a. The Great Wave or simply, The Wave) is by far Hokusai’s most famous and duplicated work. Hokusai produced The Great Wave around1830-1833, and it was part of a series of his wood prints titled Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji. In The Great Wave, Mt. Fuji is seen in the background as people in boats appear to be in peril by the threatening seas.

When I was a grad student at MLML (1975-1978), posters of the lab’s wave logo were sprinkled around the lab. I recognized the similarity between the lab’s wave and Hokusai’s The Great Wave. I had liked Hokusai’s The Great Wave so much that my grandmother made a needlepoint of the work, and to this day, her needlepoint of The Great Wave still hangs in our living room.

I don’t know who originally designed MLML’s Wave logo or when it was designed, but I think it was a great choice. To me, MLML’s Wave captured the same feelings of excitement as Hokusai’s The Great Wave. In both works of art, you can almost hear the churning seas and smell the salt spray. I also thought it was appropriate that the designers of the MLML Wave logo omitted the people and boats in peril shown in Hokusai’s work, and instead, used sea birds gently gliding in front of the sun to create a sense of calm and peacefulness. I believed that MLML’s Wave accurately portrays the labs relaxed atmosphere of teaching and learning.

 

When I graduated and left MLML, I asked for and received one of the MLML Wave posters, and I proudly hung the poster in my office at the California Maritime Academy, CSU, where I taught marine sciences for 35 years until I retired. The poster now hangs in my garage among my most treasured keepsakes.

An aside  by Jim Harvey: Lynn McMasters has been the MLML graphic artist for years, and has been responsible for many of the renditions of the Wave and other MLML artwork, including the current logo and sticker at the top of this blog.

Lynn told me (Jim) the original Wave logo was developed by a class at SJSU before MLML was started, and that the positioning of the birds in the image to form a "M" and an "L" was intentional.

Response from Chuck Versaggi: I see in the Lloyd Kitazano blog post and your endnote that, according to Lynn McMasters, it was her understanding that a SJSU class designed the MLML Wave logo. Well, I’d like to set the record straight: I designed that logo circa 1969-1970, which superseded a short-lived design that Dave Lewis created based on the Beatles Yellow Submarine. Alas, I don’t have any graphic evidence to support my claim, but I can assure you this is true. I could probably get Dave Lewis and perhaps Shane Andersen (cc’d) to corroborate this (Dave Lewis , in fact, did confirm). And, yes, the positioning of the gulls to evoke the “M” and “L” was my creative intention, as was the stylized wave inspired by Hokusai’s The Great Wave.

So we owe this awesome design to Chuck Versaggi, thanks Chuck.

By Jim Harvey, Lynne Krasnow, Dave Lewis, Judy Johnson, Jack Ames, Tom Harvey, Barry Turner,  Chuck Versaggi , and Genny and Shane Anderson (3 December 2015)

One of the early members of the MLML faculty was G. Victor Morejohn, the first marine mammal and seabird specialist at MLML. Dr. Morejohn died on 29 January 2011 at the age of 87. His first name was Gonzalo but everyone called him Dr. Morejohn, Victor, Vic, or MasJuan (but not to his face). He was our major advisor as we went through MLML, and we have lots of stories to tell. He was an old school scientist, a true natural historian with a lot of experience with wildlife and as much experience, if not more, with domestic animals because he had a ranch for most of his life. Kenneth Coale said it well: “He was from an era of marine biological exploration that many in the University IACUC committees could not fully appreciate.”

Jim Harvey’s (1978) remembrances: Dr. Morejohn would lecture about marine vertebrates with a piece of chalk in both hands or chalk in one hand and an eraser in the other. He would create the most intricate, precise, accurate, and beautiful sketches of animals (e.g. external morphology, anatomy, physiology, etc.). I would try and replicate them on my note pad and it was pathetic compared with his drawings, and then within minutes his other hand had erased the board and more drawings appeared. You can see many of his works of art in his publications (see below), and I have a small cast of a California sea lion in my office at MLML that was done by him.

I also remember a day on one of the Boston Whalers in Monterey Bay with just Dr. Morejohn and me. I forget why we were out there but at some point I am standing up driving the Whaler as Vic shouts out that there is a White-tailed Tropicbird behind us. As he was expressing what a rare sighting this was, I looked back and then suddenly had the sensation that something was coming my way. I immediately ducked as Vic pulled the trigger on the shotgun with the barrel now over my head. I then asked why he shot something so rare and he said it was not supposed to be here and we needed the specimen. I think the bird is now housed at California Academy of Sciences.

Lynne Krasnow's (1978) remembrances: In addition to his genius in functional anatomy and his artistic talent, Victor Morejohn had a wicked sense of humor. I made a special trip from Davis to meet him when I applied for the masters program and didn't he just have to pull out a box of sea otter baculums (baculi? in any case, penis bones) as a show-and-tell? I must have passed the red-face test because he accepted me as grad student. Even more memorable: when I finished my degree, he took me out with a birding class from SJSU to ensure I was no longer a shorebird collection virgin. I got lucky and downed a shorebird with a single shot, except it fell on the mud. You know, the sticky, sucking mud along the shores of Elkhorn Slough. You can't walk on that stuff, or at least not very far. So Dr. Morejohn slid across the mud on his hands and knees - using the oars from the Boston Whalers as skids - and then carried the dead bird back to the boat in his teeth, with blood dripping onto his shirt. Oh yes, some memories of my time as Morejohn's student will never fade. Happy hunting, Vic!

Dave Lewis’ remembrances: Vic Morejohn introduced me to the wonders of marine science during the 1969 summer session at MLML, where he taught a one-week workshop in marine birds and mammals. It was my first biology class since my freshman year in high school. Because it was only an introductory survey course designed for teachers' continuing education the material was readily absorbed, I did well, and Vic invited me to take the fully loaded birds and mammals class at MLML during the fall semester. It was a stiff challenge for me to stay competitive in that course, but Vic's well organized material and his remarkable lecturing skills kept me motivated, and the course became an epiphany; a personal paradigm shift.

Dr. Morejohn's lectures were amazing to me. He would present a body of factual material, say about the structural modifications of a pinniped flipper, then proceed to the blackboard where after a few seemingly random strokes of chalk a near-3D image of the flipper skeleton would suddenly emerge. He had a magical gift in this regard. Time and again seemingly random lines would coalesce into a coherent image, as if a switch had been thrown. We were all mesmerized by it, and I have no doubt that the effect on us was to more deeply embed the knowledge of vertebrate structure into our brains than any other method could. The pace of his lectures was always controlled so that one could manage to both absorb the material and get complete notes written for reinforcement.

Vic's talents easily merged the disciplines of art and science to create new visions of the world for his students that were greater than the individual components. Whether it was his chalkboard representations of sea lion skulls, his impeccable dissections of cetacean flippers or his bronze sea lion sculptures, his works always seemed to show an enhanced dimension.

Somewhere along the way Vic became interested in marine mammal baculae. I think perhaps he found these useful in paleontological digs, or maybe it was just sublimation (thanks Taffy Stewart!). Regardless, when he retired we had a complete series from his collection bronzed and mounted (Ha!) in a walnut case built by Gary McDonald, which we presented to him at a small but lively retirement bash.

Victor was an old school naturalist that recognized the value of field collection of museum and study specimens. While at MLML he aggressively expanded the teaching and museum collections of marine birds and mammals. He had served with an advance squadron in Burma during WWII (?) acquiring specimens prior to a possible invasion by American troops. His collection activities at MLML were sometimes controversial, most notably the tagging and collection of Dall's porpoises by hand-forged harpoons that he made himself.

The MLML bone yard was a small picket-fenced area where we processed Vic's open-air collection of marine mammal skeletons, with able assistance from his dermestid beetle colony.  Squeamishness was not an option there, and Vic and his students endured plenty of aromatherapy prior to its current run of popularity.  One day I watched Vic charge out of his office with his shotgun, headed to the bone yard to dispatch a student’s dog that had jumped the picket fence and was chewing on a sea lion femur.  Fortunately, mayhem was averted, but we were never quite sure whether he intended to shoot the dog or the student.

Jack Ames remembrances: My most vivid memory of him was his ability to draw on the board with both hands at the same time while lecturing.  He lectured with passion.

Judy Johnson's (1972) remembrances: I did go visit him @ his ranch in the Applegate Valley, OR some 15 or so years ago (see attached). He had 1 whole room dedicated to bear skulls that he was doing some research on - it smelled up the whole house.

Tom Harvey remembrances:  To characterize Dr. Morejohn as a perfect blend of scientist, rancher, and artist is spot on; his artistic talent most often shown while effortlessly drawing accurate sketches of marine mammals and birds on the black board.  Watching him dive into dissection of a beach cast specimen was always a great learning experience and also sometimes an adventure.  One of those culminated for me when a 30-foot gray whale came ashore on Zmudowski beach and the class met onsite while he began to cut through the blubber layer into the body cavity. Suddenly, the tissue began to bubble, snap, and tear of its own accord; Dr. Morejohn yelled for us to move back fast as the interior of the whale exploded, belching out gasses and huge coils of dark intestine that boiled out and soon were piled high; burying the very spot where we had just been working.  Seeing how he handled specimens it was obvious he intimately knew every facet of these materials and appreciated the wealth of information they contained.

Another memory was of Vic instructing me how I was to extract a family of skunks from live traps I had set while working with colonial birds on the Elkhorn Slough salt ponds.  After somehow successfully relocating them with what I felt were only limited mishaps, I was still greeted by him chuckling with raised sniffing whiskers as I entered the room that morning.  His lectures were mesmerizing and I still treasure my old class notes.  I came as a student in 1975 already interested in seabirds but after a few sessions with Morejohn, I knew I was hooked for life on marine birds and mammals and a career in natural resources.

Barry Turner's (1973) remembrances:

My family had a bearskin rug, passed down through several generations and always used in a cabin in the Sierras. The family always referred to it as a 'grizzly bear'. Eventually the bearskin fell apart but the skull was saved and I ended up with it when I was still a kid. It was an impressive room decoration.

In 1973, near the end of my MLML days, I took the skull in to show to Dr. Morejohn. He immediately recognized that it was not a grizzly but rather a Eumetopias jubatus (Steller sea lion). He was blown away, saying that it was the largest one he'd ever measured, and I gave it to him to add to his collection. He explained that at the time the bear became a rug, grizzly skulls had significant value and taxidermists would switch them for a relatively worthless, but very similar, Eumatopias skull to make a little extra profit on the side.

Dr. Morejohn later told me that he'd sent the skull to the collection at San Jose State College.

Charles “Chuck” Versaggi's  (1974) Remembrances:

“Power to the People!” “On Strike, Shut it Down!” 1968 was a tumultuous year of political assassinations, anti-Vietnam protests, campus riots, Black Panthers breaking into our SF State invertebrate class, and college president S.I. Hayakawa losing his wool tam o’ shanter cap to a mob of protesting students.

Intoxicated and stoned with visions of being a marine biologist, following in the steps of Jacques Cousteau and Mike Nelson (Lloyd Bridges of Sea Hunt fame), Moss Landing Marine Labs was the haven I needed to escape the turbulent ‘60s. I came to MLML in 1968, nearly a lifetime ago, as a 22-year old undergraduate from SF State University. With me from SF State were my close friends Gary Carmignani (my housemate at nearby Sunset State Beach), Victor Anderlini, Jim Brenner, Bill Davis, and later, Bud Laurent — part of a group of some 30 students from the California state college consortium that supported the lab.

I was an undergraduate and graduate student through 1974, and Vic Morejohn was my graduate advisor, life mentor and sometimes surrogate father who helped to keep me grounded through those formative years of drugs, sex and rock and roll. During the latter part of that period, I was a graduate student assistant for Morejohn’s marine vertebrate classes; and later, I taught the Marine Vertebrates Class for one semester.

Morejohn’s lectures were a mesmerizing mix of science, natural history, biographical adventure, and sly anecdotes. His unforgettable Walrus-moustache smile, and hairy eyebrow raised behind wire-rim glasses, evoked a hint of “dirty old man,” especially when he proudly showed off his personal stash of marine-mammal penis bones.

Morejohn’s low stature belied his bigger-than-life persona. He was a passionate classical scientist, consummate teacher and brilliant artist. His marine vertebrate classes were a deep dive into marine fish, birds, and mammals — from anatomy to physiology, natural history to ecology — replete with dripping blood, squishy guts, and smelly gore. He was able to engage all of your senses and your imagination, as he recounted his life experiences as an animal collector as far as the South Pole. I would marvel at his ability to simultaneously draw with two hands on the blackboard, seamlessly explaining an anatomical feature and connecting the emerging figure to the animal’s ecology.

The lab section of his classes was where his unique style of teaching and personal narrative came together. Here is where I learned the names of all the bones of a fish by gluing them together, fully mounted like the model airplanes I used to assemble as a kid. I did the same for a bird skeleton (do you know what a synsacrum is?). Corn meal is more than a food staple — it’s what you use to soak up fat when making a study skin of a bird or mammal. Taking his “hands-on” final exam was actually fun (once he put a glob of God knows what on a petri dish, tricking you into a identifying it as something profound and meaningful).

Although I’m not a practicing marine biologist (it took me several more years of schooling and a PhD to learn academic life was not for me), the names of hundreds of marine vertebrates are still burned indelibly into my brain and my love for natural history is unabated. The marine vertebrate lab was where I came to appreciate the beauty of an articulated skeleton, and that bone is a dynamic, homeostatic organ — more than a static structure on which to hang your muscles.

Thanks Vic for the life lessons and wonderful memories — chasing Dall’s porpoises, seeing them eye-to-eye from the bow of a Boston Whaler…conducting smell-quenching necropsies while casually eating lunch on scores of sea otter carcasses (and a few other marine mammals)…the joy of identifying a mystery bird, fish or marine mammal…wind-in-your face boat runs up Elkhorn Slough to watch birds and hauled-out Harbor Seals (sea otters were rare in those days)…gill-netting hundreds of fish for later identification (and eating!)…studying whales aboard the Orca on Monterey Bay, distinguishing their spouts, flukes, and dorsal fins…weekend stays in “the Bunker” on Año Nuevo Island, savoring the sights and smells of northern elephant seals (for you budding mammalogists that’s Mirounga angustirostris)…and late-night runs to the Richmond Whaling Station to collect tissue specimens and parasites from Gray whales as part of a population study by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife (an experience I captured on film, “The Richmond Whaling Station: The Last U.S. Whaling Station.”).

And thanks, too, to MLML for giving me those unforgettable years of enduring kinship with so many vertebrate friends — human and otherwise.

Genny and Shane Anderson's (1971) Remembrances:

Genevieve (Genny) Bockus Anderson with input from Shane Anderson (both students at MLML circa 1968-1971):

Dr. Morejohn was not only a great teacher but someone who took extra time to make opportunities for students. Back in 1969/1970/1971 the Richmond Whaling Station was winding down, taking the last whales killed by the United States (see the story at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Goo2MHirBLs). Dr. Morejohn made arrangements for some of the MLML students to meet the whalers as the dead whales came ashore at Richmond. We were given 15 minutes on each whale before it was cut up (mostly for dog food). We went up to the whaling station many times (2 hours away from MLML) using the MLML carryall. We were organized into different activities to efficiently use the 15 minutes. Scientific data on each whale was taken including all the basic measurements. Then, each of us had a specific ‘project’ that we worked on. I worked on the gray whale’s cyamid amphipods so I busily scooped them into sample jars from the blowhole area, rostrum, genital area and other body areas. Shane Anderson worked on the barnacles so he was busy cutting patches of barnacles off the whale. Ken Briggs, as I remember it, strung white yarn between the fronts of the barnacles and took pictures which showed the direction of water flow over the whale’s surface. I remember Dan Varoujean, Larry Talent, John Hansen, Dave Lewis and Chuck Versaggi were also on the trips (and there were probably others) but I can’t remember their projects and we all didn’t go each time.

 

Dr. Morejohn actually created a class so we would get units for our studies. It was called “Whale Ectoparasites” – or, in my case ended up on my transcript as DGS (Directed Group Studies) Advanced Studies Marine Science (ML 6903). We all wrote up papers on what we learned for the class. The experience at the whaling station was a rare opportunity and one few marine biologists will ever have. I have two outstanding memories of this awesome experience.   First, the smell of the whaling station which nearly made me vomit the first time but after 5 minutes it went away and the only thing to worry about was being careful not to slip on the oily floor. Since that time, when I walk the beach I can smell a dead marine mammal from afar. Second, was the trip when we were transporting a load of whale bones back to MLML, covered with a tarp, on the roof of the MLML carryall. When we stopped for gas we were surrounded by law enforcement officers (can’t remember if it was CHP, Sherriff or Police) who said they had received reports of someone transporting something under a tarp with blood dripping down the sides of the vehicle. (This was the era of the Manson Murders so you can imagine what they thought.) Well, there was a lot of blood dripping down the carryall and it did look pretty suspicious.   We students had not noticed this because it was dark. The law enforcement officers were first relieved it was not a grizzly discovery and then impressed with our bloody whale bones. They wished us well but I imagine they didn’t quite know what they were going to find under the tarp and probably had some good tales to tell their colleagues. I have always considered my whaling station experiences to be one of the highlights of my MLML education – a chance to take unique specimens in a unique location and do a research project while contributing to scientific knowledge.

 

I know that Dr. Morejohn had to do a lot of extra work to allow us to have this opportunity (and we never saw any students from other institutions at the station, so we may have been the only ones to have this unique experience). He was always interested in scientific data, whether at work or on his farm, and encouraging students to be aware of their surroundings. He was one of my role models for teaching and I often thought of him during my 37 years of teaching Marine Biology at Santa Barbara City College where I tried to give my students as much field experience and data taking as possible.

PS Dr. Morejohn also passed on to me his fascination for baculae (mentioned by others). I used this in my classes for extra points for students who could identify a walrus baculum. Only one student in 37 years was creative enough to properly identify this – my students were all freshmen and my class was usually their first marine biology class.

 

Dan Varoujean adds some more thoughts (7 December 2015):

I do remember the Scotty incident.  After informing Morejohn that Scotty's dog had gotten into the bone yard and destroyed one of the porpoise skeletons I had spent weeks cleaning up, he was incensed.  That afternoon while sitting at my desk in the museum I heard Scotty berating Morejohn in the hallway, then I heard Scotty screaming and doors slamming.  As I went down the hallway I looked into Morejohn's office and noticed his gun cabinet was open and shotshells were on the floor.  I ran to the back door, and like you (i.e. Dave Lewis) saw Morejohn pointing a shotgun at Scotty, who was clutching his dog, telling him to put the dog down so he could blow it away.  I recall having to provide "testimony" to Robert Arnal (sp?) about this incident.  His response was amazing: "I would have shot the dog myself, given he had told Scotty numerous times to keep his dog off the compound".  Can  you imagine what would happen today to a professor who had pointed a shotgun at a student?

Has anyone told Jim Harvey about Morejohn's Dall's Porpoise harpooning incident? If you recall Charlie Vierra (sp?) had modified a 30-06 rifle by cutting the barrel back so that a harpoon Charlie had made would fit into the barrel.  Charlie also loaded up some blank rounds of ammo for use in the rifle. As I recall Baltz was onboard (I don't remember if you or Ken was onboard) when I drove he and Morejohn out over the Monterey Canyon in the Orca.  Morejohn was lying on the front deck with the armed rifle in hand when we picked up a school of Dall's, but Morejohn didn't get a shot before the school broke off.  Morejohn turned to me and signaled for me to circle back, which I did and as we were joined by the Dall's again he took a shot, but the rifle report was muffled and the harpoon just fell off the rifle.  After we had retrieved  the harpoon, which was tied to a tire tube with a 10 ft. line, he instructed Baltz to remove the paper wadding out of two of the rounds and double up the powder load.  We again picked up the school, and on the first pass Morejohn did not get a shot, but on the next pass he did.  This time the report was louder, but again the harpoon just fell out of the barrel albeit a little faster this time.  Morejohn then instructed Baltz to triple the load.  I remember Don turning to me and saying that the powder now filled the casing and he could barely get the paper wading into the neck of the casing.  Both of us, having reloaded our own hunting ammunition, realized that this was probably too much powder, but Morejohn insisted on using this "compressed" load.  We again picked up the school and Morejohn fired on the first pass.  There was an enormous flash and thunderous report.  Both Don and I thought that Morejohn had been seriously injured, but luckily he only burned off his eyelashes, most of his eyebrows and part of his moustache.  The Dall's Porpoise was stone dead off our starboard side with a hole in it the size of a softball.  Fortunately, the harpoon, which had passed all the way through the chest, had hung up on the carcass so we could retrieve the tire tube and the animal. We later figured out what had happened.  When Morejohn didn't fire on our first passes he would raise the rifle and point it skyward as a safety measure until we picked up the school again, which allowed seawater that was covering the harpoon to run down the barrel, soak through the wading and wet the powder.  After this excursion, Morejohn determined it was too dangerous to use the harpoon gun, and upon consultation with Baltz they decided we use the harpooning method of their Portuguese ancestors; hence, why we started hand lancing.

By Kate Sawyers (16 November 2015)

Over the past 13 years, the MLML Quilt Guild has met every Wednesday evening, give or take a few missed times for holidays and vacations. Still hard to believe it’s been this long. How did we come to be? Maybe we owe our existence to Kenneth Coale. He was the one who tasked Lynn McMasters to try to figure out a way to fix the acoustics in that small windowless triangular space known as the Group Study Room. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise because that little room was the starting point for our many adventures in fabric.

Lynn designed the large Blue Whale panels and after much help from students and staff, we assembled them and continued on with the large quilt panels on the 3^rd wall. It seemed to work! No more echo in the room. Yet, we continued sewing. People came and went but there was a core group of 7-8 people that came every Wednesday evening and still meets at the Labs. After the project was finished, or maybe even before, someone suggested that maybe we should make a quilt to fund a student scholarship at MLML. By this time over a year had passed. We decided to make a wall hanging quilt of different vignettes of sea and shore life.  Amazingly, we raised $2000. That was quite motivating!  We named the scholarship in memory of former MLML technician Signe Lundstrum, a young woman from a family of artists who was creative, imaginative, enthusiastic, and coincidentally…enjoyed quilting.

We are pretty much an agreeable bunch.  There isn't much dissent except for the occasional fabric disagreement, critter placement, or exact coloring of a certain species. That first quilt was won by Vida Kenk, former Professor, Invertebrate Biologist and Associate Dean of Science at SJSU. Vida later graciously invited us to their family cabin in the Sierras.  For the next several years we planned getaway weekend "Quilt Camps" where we concentrated on our craft and enjoyed some delicious dinners with Vida and her husband Bill Minkel.

 

In 2010 we were honored to be profiled in American Quilter Magazine with an article titled, “Quilters to the Rescue”. That same year our Leafy Sea Dragon Quilt “Dragon Lady”, another scholarship project, won the Judge’s Choice and Viewer’s Choice Awards at the Monterey Peninsula Quilt Show.

Over the years, we have made a total of five scholarship quilts, raised over $10K, and provided twenty-two scholarships. We’ve had side jobs too. The Save the Whales organization asked us to design and construct two children’s costumes, a Leatherback Turtle and a Sea Habitat for their educational outreach program. This allowed us to raise another $1000 for the scholarship fund.

We’ve also enjoyed making baby quilts for staff and students. At last count, we had completed 20 baby quilts. Our first baby quilt recipient is now 10 years old?!?!

In December we will be giving away our newest quilt, “Chiton Crossing”, our rendition of Tonicella lineata, commonly known as the lined chiton. Opportunity drawing tickets are still available!

Our latest and most challenging endeavor is a quilt panel to be permanently displayed at MLML to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Moss Landing Marine Laboratories. It is comprised of over 5000 pieces, not including the many embellishments that will be appliquéd on the panel to highlight, in fabric form, the many accomplishments of MLML over the past 50 years.

2015 MLML Quilt Guild members are: Lynn McMasters, Donna Kline, Sara Tanner, Stephanie Flora, Lois DeVogelaere, Karen Wallace, Jennifer Hansen, and Kate Sawyers. Newcomers are always welcome!

By  Mary Yoklavich, Andrew DeVogeleare, Mark Silberstein, Kenneth Coale, Mike Foster

Housing has always been a challenge for students at the Lab, which results in lots of interesting variations on what constitutes a home. One housing opportunity came with the job as student caretaker of the property. The lineage of students living in the MLML Caretaker’s Trailer is open to debate, but we think that John Oliver (Invert Lab, class of 1973) might have been the first and maybe the longest occupant. When Mike Foster arrived in 1976, he remembers that Steve Pace (class of 1978) served as caretaker and lived in the trailer just inside the cyclone fence that separated the Lab from the parking lot. Most memorable to Mike was caretaker Guillermo Moreno (Ich Lab, class of 1990), who hosted some outstanding margarita parties from the trailer. Andrew DeVogelaere (Phycology lab, class of 1986) was actually offered the caretaker job at one point, but the requirement of being at the Lab every weekend was too much of a commitment for him.  He now expresses some regret.

Most occupants of the trailer were male students, probably because it could sometimes be a pretty lonely spot alone on the island all night. Kenneth Coale remembers that Heather Robinson (Ich lab, class of 2006), one of the few female trailer dwellers, got ‘creeped out’ when maintaining the property and dealing with vagabonds of questionable intent. The student caretaker was eventually moved into an apartment that was built upstairs at the end of the building in the former Sea Grant Office next to the original library.

And now MLML has two formidable brothers who watch over the labs: Billy who is informally known as the "Sheriff of Moss Landing" and James, an ex-correctional officer from the California State Prison in Soledad who dishes out his famous barbecue venison to students working late at the Labs.

As to the caretaker trailer, it became part of maintenance -- as in the first picture – and it sure needed some. At some point the trailer was moved to the pier property (now the site of MLMLs new Aquaculture Facility) on the island across from the bridge. And then it was eventually scrapped – a very sad end to a significant structure that served MLML students well.

Because none of us can remember the names and years of all the students that occupied the MLML trailer, we have put together the following list of possibilities and ask you all to correct the record by adding/removing names and dates and by leaving your own memory of those who lived in the caretaker trailer:

John Oliver

Pete Slattery

Ed Osada

Dan Watson

Larry Hulberg

Steve Pace - 1975-1976?

Howard Teas 1978-?

Steve Rushkin 1976 (although he may have lived in a camper in the parking lot)

Cheryl Hannan 1976  (although she may have lived in her bus in the parking lot and not in the trailer per se)

Bruce Stewart 1977 (he lived in a trailer behind the Shark House on the Island, and may have occupied the caretaker trailer as well)

Mary Margaret Perez

Kathy Heath 1980 - 1983?

Kevin Hill 1983 -86

Bill Hayden

Pan-wen Hsue 1985 - 1986

Guillermo Moreno 1987 - 1989

Steve Osborn 1989

Steve Trumble 1991 -1992 (ML trailers)

Kristen Carlson 1992-1993 (shorelab)

Brendan Daly (at Salinas campus of MLML)

Tony Orr (at Salinas campus of MLML)

Stephanie Flora 1993 - 1997

Heather Robinson

Jose Antonio (Tony) Alicea-Pou (at the shore lab triplewide area during the Salinas trailer daze)

Rafael Riosmena Rodriguez (SML)

Carlos Cintra Buenrostro  (who transitioned to the new lab on the hill)

James Cochran (Main Lab), Billy Cochran (Norte)

 

Comments:

Lynn Krasnow: Oh my goodness the trailer pics bring back memories! Keep up the good work - I'm enjoying the blog!

Susan Coale: I'm pretty sure Mary Margaret Perez occupied that lovely trailer in the late 70's -early 80's.  I also remember a couple-Ted and Julia (whose last names escape me). Ted was the shop person.  I remember Ted as a very kind man who built what we called the slough boat- very shallow draft-I guess he got tired of students getting stuck in the mud (kind of a right of passage, as far as I'm concerned).  Anyway, we all thought it was wonderful.  Julia, his wife, was the janitor.  I was comforted by her presence when I was at the lab late at night running experiments.   They also had a milk cow and we could get fresh whole milk from them.  Then, as I recall, they left the lab to farm avocados in Corralitos -but I think they lost their trees during a particularly cold winter.

Carrie Bretz: Carrie sent this picture of one of the caretakers (Gomer) and his friend Guillermo Moreno

John Oliver: I was the first caretaker. USGS had an old trailer they used for many years and finally gave it to MLML, where it sat in a sand dune. We had no tractor or other way to move it, until a student body meeting ended in 30 kids pushing and pulling the trailer to the east side of the old marine lab, where it sat for many years. The late John Bell, our amazing maintenance guru, and I built a new kitchen, fixed the roof, and made a cozy little room. I was the keeper of the keys, and let folk into anything locked. It was wonderful to have a room on the beach next to the labs I worked in and the library, showers, and lots of room to roam and hang out. I remember many late nights sitting on the beach or the Moss Landing pier (now gone) watching the red tide glow in the breaking waves. It was every bit as awesome as a polar arora. The early and mid 1970’s was colder, foggier, rainier, and rougher than any similar period since then. Storms were strong and frequent, and one of the funnest events was watching the waves break on the library windows. It was the end of a cold period in the PDO (shifted after 1976), and we are at that same time right now at the end of the next cold period. Will we have a half decade or so of the 1970’s weather? I lived in the trailer for a year before going to SIO. Peter Slattery was the second caretaker. He lived in the trailer for a year, and was followed by Steve Pace.

By Andrew DeVogelaere (4 November 2015)

In the 80s, 90s, and parts of this past decade, MLML Halloween parties were held at the Elkhorn Yacht Club. Recently the party has been up at the main lab in the seminar room. The setting at the Yacht Club was conducive to wild times: live bands, plenty of free drinks in the front grass area, pool tables, a large dance floor, and a full bar in the back. The costumes featured marine themes (e.g., sharks and jellies), topical events (e.g., Tonya Harding and Jeff Gillooly with Nancy Kerrigan) and ghoulish presentations (e.g., a walking body bag and the flattened I-880 overpass). Part of the deal between MLML and the Yacht Club was that we had to allow their members to attend. That meant the masked character constantly bumping into you or staring at you all night long could be a friend playing a prank or an odd Club member; it added to the fun. The evening always included a costume contest, and I remember that Greg Cailliet and John Heine were often in the finals. Enjoy a few pictures below from  some of the parties, and send us a comment if you remember other good costumes, have other scary memories, or better yet send us a picture with a label.

Email us with your comments and pictures. Happy Halloween!

 

Here is a comment and picture from David Schwartz:

Attached is a picture I'm particularly fond of from the end
of the Halloween party of 1980 or 1981. Rich Rasch on the
left, who passed away in 2008 from a heart attack, me in
the middle, and my wife to be Vera Brown on the right.

By Jim Harvey (Additions from Kenneth Coale) (30 October 2015)

 

After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake had destroyed the main buildings of MLML, Faculty and Researchers scattered. Some moved in with the recently established MBARI in Pacific Grove, others filled the vaults of the abandoned bank in Castroville with museum samples, Administration moved into the Blue House, at one time MLML was scattered over 34 locations in Monterey County, including the abandoned sugar mill in Spreckles. In spite of this separation MLML continued to function as a multicellular organism, whose cells were strewn about. Classes were being held outside, or in other host facilities and e-mail was not yet a functioning communication tool. It was finally decided that MLML should consolidate and would temporarily relocate to Salinas. Initially Gail Fullerton (SJSU President at the time) arranged for MLML to be relocated to a new but unoccupied satellite campus of SJSU on Blanco Circle near the southern outskirts of Salinas. Within a year or so, it was obvious that MLML had to find a new home and luckily the Monterey County Office of Education was planning to place pre-constructed buildings in a lot right next to MLML’s temporary location on Blanco Circle. Thus the “MLML Salinas Trailer Park” years began in 1991 (Fig. 1).

 

Some of us called our temporary laboratories the “Salinas Marine Lab” (SML), appropriately pronounced smell because of the morning odor of chocolate from a nearby Nestle factory and the aroma of fertilizers from the surrounding fields as onshore breezes started in the afternoon. Midday was a nice mix. The cemetery to the rear of the property kept one side of the property quiet, and reminded us of how lucky we were, whereas the nearby hospital truck traffic serenaded us with an anthropogenic cacophony. The sounds and smells of the place were unfamiliar and nothing about the location resembled a marine lab, except…. all marine Labs have trailers

Much of the MLML equipment, materials and supplies were placed in storage at a warehouse on Vertin Avenue in Salinas. “Vertin” also contained the machine shop facilities because the trailers did not have the necessary power or space to support fabrication. The library, some shop equipment, research labs, administrative offices, and teaching classrooms were jammed into these pre-constructed buildings. A triple-wide served as our “seminar room”. Although most of the teaching and lab research was conducted at SML, a variety of trailers and other buildings back on the shores of Monterey Bay provided space for a classroom, the Benthic Lab, State Mussel Watch program, Sea Grant Marine Advisor, USGS, some of the Trace Metals lab, Diving, Marine Operations and others.

Functioning as a marine lab was now all the more challenging based on our existence in trailers, the distance of Salinas to the ocean, and the lack of running seawater. Commute times soared, especially for those commuting from Santa Cruz County.  And how can it be called a “real” marine lab without the smell of rotting kelp on the beach. Many of the faculty had their offices in their lab trailers, so conversations with students or others were not that private. But the number of students applying to MLML and graduating did not decrease during the 10 + years that MLML remained in Salinas. In fact, MLML enrollment increased … a true testament to the “spirit” of MLML. Many students spent their entire MLML career at the trailers and still valued their education and experience. One great benefit was that we closer to good Mexican food.

My wife Mary reminisced about her impressions of working in the Ichthyology Trailer as a research associate (and former grad student) of Greg Cailliet during this time. Even though his office and laboratory space had been dramatically reduced by at least 50%, Greg thoughtfully and generously made room for everyone. The Ich Trailer included: three tiny offices (with doors) for Greg, Val Loeb, and Mary; a common space housing several graduate students elbow-to-elbow along a work bench, each one peering into their microscopes to sort plankton, or count daily growth bands in otoliths, or identify prey items from fish stomachs, while other students performed chemical analyses under an exhaust hood rigged up in the trailer. Even a past student returned to finish writing his thesis while in the trailer. It sounds like a hardship, but the experience must have made the students extra resilient and determined because most of them now are successful research professionals at universities and federal labs from Hawaii to Santa Barbara to Seattle and beyond.

This existence lasted for another 10 years until MLML finally moved back into the new building on January 10, 2000, having stretched considerably, the definition of “temporary”.

We would love for you to comment and describe your experiences from the Trailer Daze.

 

Here is the picture to which Andrew refers in his Comments below:

 

By Jim Harvey, Kenneth Coale, and Greg Cailliet (21 October 2015)

 

An institution such as ours exists on many levels. MLML is loosely integrated into the fabric of the State’s educational system, we have a community presence (both fiscally and organizationally), we are involved at local, state and federal levels through formal agreements, and we are socially connected. We are also personally connected to a group of individuals who resonate strongly with our mission, our values, ethics and deeds. These are our allies, who at critical times, have stepped up to help us out of a jamb, or helped us to solve a difficult problem. We would not have them without strong personal connections and an impressive and honorable institutional record. Although there are many such individuals, around this time of year (October 17) our memories bring to mind a few who really made a difference for us.

MLML survived the earthquake and was able to create an incredible new home on the hill in part because of two amazing individuals, Jon Raggett and Larry Horan. Both of them are no longer with us but their relatively recent deaths seemed to beg for us to tell their stories.

After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, the lab had been destroyed but all the equipment, furniture, samples, computers, and DATA were still in the building. The Monterey County officials immediately came out to the site and red tagged the building. No one was to enter the building, and the plan was to raze the entire building without allowing the contents to be removed. This was outrageous.

There were unpublished thesis data and long-term datasets in there, there were valuable samples collected over many years in there, there were atomic absorption spectrophotometers, an electron microscope, alpha spectrometers, microscopes, tools, an entire library, furniture, and there was other good stuff in there, as well. In addition, there were thousands of reagents, toxic substances, and environmental hazards. There was enough Rhodamine dye to turn Elkhorn Slough pink and probably enough formalin to pickle all organisms there as well. To simply scrape the building and take it to a landfill would miss an important salvage opportunity and create an environmental disaster. Director John Martin had a friend who was an engineer, Jon Raggett.

Jon Raggett had gone through the Carmel schools, graduated from Princeton, received an M.S. from Stanford, and a Ph.D. from Princeton. He was trained as an engineer, and had worked in earthquake research and structural engineering. John talked to Jon, and Jon convinced the Monterey County folks to allow him to oversee some short-term shoring of the structure that would allow the MLML people access to the building to remove its contents. So over a few days Jon instructed us where to place posts and beams, and a small crew of faculty, staff, and students with hardhats on would enter a room and quickly pass all the things in the room out the door. Outside the building was a long line of MLMLers that passed the contents along until it reached waiting U-Haul vans that carried the insides of MLML to Salinas.

 

Jon basically saved the day and the data. Many a thesis was saved, and now much of what we have in the new building is stuff removed from the old lab. We would have had to start from scratch if Jon had not come to our rescue.

Jon Raggett’s contribution to MLML is fitting because one of his many accomplishments was the creation of School3, a nonprofit that funded building schools in developing countries. School3 has built more than 71 schools in places like Africa, Honduras, and India. We think you can add one more school to that list because Jon was a huge part of rebuilding MLML.

The other person that was instrumental to the rebuilding of MLML was Larry Horan. MLML had been told shortly after the earthquake that a new building would be constructed within 2 years. After moving to Salinas into temporary trailers, a long battle began about whether we could place a new lab on the hill in Moss Landing. Some local residents did not think it was wise to place the lab on the hill, thus began many days spent presenting our case to the Board of Supervisors or any other regulatory agency considering the location of the displaced MLML. It soon was apparent that we needed local representation that knew the law, knew the local politics, and could argue our position in all the various places. We found Larry Horan, and his legal partner, Mark Blum.

Larry was a remarkable individual. He was a graduate of Boldt Law School at UC Berkeley where he also played intercollegiate basketball. This helped to both feed and sharpen his competitive edge on and off the court(s).  He also was known as a scholar of the first amendment, which helped him not only to champion for those seeking first amendment protection, but also to listen deeply to what people of different persuasions were saying. He took this very seriously and respected everybody's voice and he in turn, earned great respect from both his colleagues and the justice system. During the earthquake reconstruction days when those fighting our plans threatened the rebuilding of MLML, careers, and every way of life for MLML, few of us were willing or able to actually hear what others were saying.  We were too busy being reactive, defensive, and fighting for our lives.  Larry would always remind us (in very gentle ways), that the success of our case would come about by listening carefully, doing our due diligence, and never interfering with another's rights.  Because he listened carefully, he was able to dismantle arguments made by our detractors and skillfully dispatch them with the utmost integrity.  It made all the difference for us to know that we had a legal giant on our side, who was first a person of integrity and compassion. He always made sure we actually did take the higher ground.

As you know we finally prevailed, a spectacular lab space was constructed, many students, staff, and faculty have enjoyed the new lab space we occupy, and the Monterey Bay community also uses this space constantly. These two fine men of the Monterey community were instrumental in getting MLML out of a wreck and into a new place.

by Mike Foster (14 October 2015)

Scientific diving has been an integral part of MLML since 1968 when the first dive class was taught at the Labs during summer session through San Francisco State. Eight students were certified. The program continued under SFS supervision with the diving course taught by MLML graduate students who were certified scuba instructors. The first resident diving officer was Tommy Thompson, hired as the faculty phycologist but also to assume responsibilities for the dive program and liaison with the growing Sea Grant Program. A State funded MLML staff position for dive officer did not exist until the early 1980s so faculty members who were interested and were instructors served as dive officers. Tommy, through Sea Grant, upgraded the program by acquiring dive equipment and support for a subtidal ecology class. He left the faculty in 1976 to become the area Sea Grant Marine Advisor.

This left an opening for a phycologist and dive officer that I gladly applied to fill. The Labs also hired Ann Hurley as co-dive officer and invertebrate ecologist. I was an inactive NAUI scuba instructor at the time, and reactivation required attending a NAUI Instructor class and doing a check out dive with an active instructor. The evaluation ranks as two of the most unpleasant dives I’ve ever had – drops to the mud at 80’ off the Labs to check on a caging experiment with grad students Larry Hulberg and Cheryl Hannan (now Zimmer) – foggy and choppy on the surface, cold and murky on the bottom – and no kelp. But I passed with an increased appreciation for Benthic Bub field work.

Neither Ann nor I were enthused about teaching the dive class, and relied on a dedicated group of MLML grad students and certified scuba instructors, including Larry Hulberg, Steve Pace and Kathy Casson, who were more than willing to teach the class. This worked well for all, and started the tradition of MLML financing instructor certification for students willing to teach the class or serve as assistants. Gary Ichikawa, Bob vanWagenen and John Heine were among those who became instructors as a result. John became full-time dive officer after MLML lobbied successfully to make it a staff position.

Dive facilities were relatively primitive – the compressor and dive locker were located in front of the outdoor aquaria in an area that had been the covered car park for the Beaudette Foundation. When I arrived the State ‘dive truck’ was a rusty, beat up International carry-all with divers using their own cars as needed. The first dive boat for the subtidal class was an old, salvaged black raft powered by a 15 horse outboard, later augmented by a donated Avon dingy towed behind the raft. The unisex shower, shared with volley ball players, was a cinder block structure outside the then seminar room with a wooden pallet on the floor. No doubt everyone who used the shower would have contracted some foot disease if they had to stand in the gunk beneath the pallet.

None of that mattered much: with Labs support MLMLers could learn to dive, get underwater, have fun, and do interesting research. The core of the dive program has always been student enthusiasm and willingness to help each other, supervised by diving officers whose main concern is making it as easy as possible to get underwater safely and efficiently.

Future blogs will include "Scientific Diving at MLML: the middle years" by John Heine, and one on the most current years by Diana Steller.

By John Heine (7 October 2015)

John Heine, former MLML graduate student and DSO, self-published a book in 2012 entitled "Marine Dreams", about a marine lab in central California. You can guess what it is based on. We provide an excerpt for this weeks blog. We hope you recognize aspects of the book. This week we also feature pictures from former student, Scott Gabara.

 

 

Monterey Bay has some of the thickest, richest kelp forests to be found.  The forests also harbor a myriad diversity of other seaweeds, invertebrates, fishes, birds and mammals. The giant kelp, Macrocystis, is one of the fastest growing plants on the planet.  It can grow a couple feet a day under ideal conditions.

Like forests found on land, the kelp forest has distinct seasons.  In the fall, when the days are warm and water circulation is low, the kelp starts to deteriorate, or senesce, and becomes weakened.  The first storms of winter can wreak havoc on the forest.

Diving in the kelp forest can be surreal at times.  Rays of sunlight stab through the surface kelp canopy and bend all over on their way to the bottom.  The kelp appears to be golden brown, and when waving back and forth in the surge, it can be quite hypnotizing.  Swimming through the forest brings all kinds of opportunities to see large fish like cabezon, lingcod, and rockfish.  If you are lucky you might swim with a harbor seal, sea lion, or sea otter.

But most of the time for Elkhorn Marine Lab students the kelp forest was just their location for experiments.  The thick canopy just means pulling up the outboard motor and rowing across the kelp canopy, as there is often no way to motor through it.  The canopy can be so thick and stable that small boats can be tied off to it, not even needing to anchor.  The spectacular days of 100 foot visibility are few, and typically the water is cold and dark.

Will was trying out his experimental apparatus for the first time in open water.  He had tried it in the lab, and it had worked just fine, but it was a whole different ballgame out here in the ocean.  His setup consisted of three acrylic boxes, which held five liter-sized canning jars for the seaweeds.   One group of jars was covered with aluminum foil to simulate dark, nighttime conditions.  He had to take the jars down without the lids on, because if they were screwed on at the surface, he would never get them off underwater due to the pressure.

After they tied up the boat to the kelp, he lowered the boxes down on a line to the bottom.  He carried a bag with the jars, lids, magnetic stir bars, and assorted tools.  His buddy, Ricardo, carried the sensor for the light meter.  Ricardo, better known as “Ricki”, was an international student from Argentina.  He could be found around EML at all hours of the day and night sipping on his mate from the traditional gourd.

On the seafloor, Will assembled the boxes and attached some weights to keep them steady on the bottom.  He collected some Sea Grapes, a bushy red seaweed which resembled small table grapes, and cut them into small pieces to be placed into the jars, along with a magnetic stir bar, which was used to keep oxygen bubbles from forming.  When all the jars were set up, including two “controls” with water only, he wrote down the start time on his slate.  Will collected a jar of ambient water to measure the initial dissolved oxygen concentration, and Ricardo cable-tied the light sensor to the side of the middle box.  Then they headed up to the surface for a break.

“Hey, that went pretty smooth,” said Ricki.

“Yeah, not too bad, thanks for the help,” Will replied, as he unscrewed the top off the thermos and poured some hot coffee.  He was shivering already from just the first dive.  I still need to order that wetsuit he thought.

“Did you see that wolf eel?” asked Ricki.

“No, where was it?”

“Right next to the boxes!  I can’t believe you didn’t see it,” exclaimed Ricki.

“Well, I was a little busy.”  It was common that you only saw what you were looking for, and often two people on the same dive saw different things.  He wished that Ricardo had pointed it out though, as he had never seen a wolf eel underwater.  He knew they could get to be about 5 feet long, and looked menacing, as they open and close their toothy jaws to pump water across their gills.

Will got out the photometer, which measures the light intensity underwater.  He hooked up the end of the cable that led to the collector on the sea floor.  After taking ambient readings in the air with the deck cell, he took some readings from underwater.  The kelp canopy typically filters out 99% of the surface light in only the top few inches of water, so light levels on the bottom can be quite low.  This was one of the questions Will had for his thesis:  how do the seasonally variable light levels affect the photosynthetic rates of some common seaweeds?  He was measuring both of these for the first time today.

As they got their tanks switched for the second dive, a sea otter popped up through the kelp nearby.  “Sandra is thinking of a sea otter costume for the Halloween party,” said Will.

“Typical mammal lab costume.  There’s at least one every year,” Ricki replied.

“Yeah, I said the same thing.  I suggested something a little more exotic like a narwhal.  What are you thinking of coming as?” asked Will.

“Maybe a homeless person, or maybe as a sponge, I’m not sure yet.  And you?” Ricki asked.

“Maybe kelp.  But does everybody have to come as representing the organism that they study?  It all seems so dull, so predictable.  Maybe I’ll just pick up a mask at the thrift store and be anonymous all night, just wander around freaking people out.  Like Nixon or something.”

“Sounds alright to me” Ricki said.

“On this dive we need to take down an extra scuba bottle and the stirring platform and give each bottle a 30 second stir.  Would you mind taking pictures of the setup?  I can use some for my thesis defense and talk at WSN (the Western Society of Naturalists, often confused with a nudist group)” said Will.

“Sure, sounds good.”

So they headed down for the second dive.  Will set up the stirring platform and placed the first acrylic tray on it.  The air-driven magnets in the jars were spun by compressed air from the scuba tank.  Will had devised this setup based on a similar one he had used as an undergraduate.  The idea was to keep oxygen bubbles from forming, because if they came out of solution, he wouldn’t be able to measure the oxygen concentration accurately.  After the 30 second stir, he did the same with the other two trays, while Ricki snapped some photos.  So far, so good, everything seemed to be working out.

After a three hour incubation time, the experiment was over.  Will and Ricki brought the jars back up to the boat, and Will put a chemical into each jar to “fix” the solution, so he could measure the oxygen concentration later in the lab.  They packed the boat up to head back to shore.   Everything needed to be well stowed, as they had to take the Zodiac through the surf up onto the sandy beach.  This was a tricky maneuver, which required some skill, patience, and timing.  As they neared the surf, Will slowed down and looked back over his shoulder to see if there were any waves coming.  His method was to wait until a set broke through, then to ride near the back of the last wave and on up to the beach.

He unlocked the engine tilt mechanism, so it would tilt up if (when) they hit the bottom.  When the time was right, he gunned the motor and they surfed right up onto the sand.  He quickly tilted the motor, and they hopped out and used the surge to drag the boat up higher on the beach.  This was the critical moment, because if the surf was high, a wave could break over the transom and swamp the boat, making it impossible to move.

They swung the boat around 180 degrees so the bow was facing the surf.  This helped to deflect the waves and keep the inside dry.  Ricki held the bow steady while Will started to unload, carrying gear up to the steps to the parking lot.  He unloaded the sensitive scientific equipment first, then they switched places and Ricki unloaded the dive gear.

When they were all packed up, they headed off to the boathouse to rinse the gear and stow it away.  The boathouse was an old fire station that was in the harbor, which made it ideal for storing boats on trailers and for launching boats to go up the slough.  It was a busy place, as most of the class field trips staged their equipment here.  After Will and Ricki cleaned up and stowed the gear, they headed down the street to the lab to work on their thesis projects.