Cannery Row! Millions know the name even if they don't know it is in Monterey, California. Some know it through John Steinbeck's 1945 classic novel, some through the 1982 movie with Nick Nolte and Debra Winger. And some know it as modern Monterey's prime boutique shopping and eating district.
Three stories in one are at play here, along Cannery Row—a name it only got in 1958, after Steinbeck's novel. Before that, it was officially Ocean View Avenue.
First, and most visible today, is the seemingly inevitable gentrification and glamorization of places that were once home and workplace to hard-scrabble working-class families.
Second, the remains of that rough life, whose characters colorfully inhabit Steinbeck's novel. The places they lived and worked and that Steinbeck made so memorable are barely visible, save for a few remaining buildings and some carefully-curated signage. The huge industrial canneries that provided food and fertilizer to consumers around the world has been gone over sixty years.
And, not really visible at all except for a preserved storefront and a principal character in Steinbeck's novel, is the story of Ed Ricketts, a man who changed the teaching of marine biology and the environment.
I won't take a lot of your time with present-day Cannery Row, because there isn't much to say about it beyond "Bring money." If you've been to San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf in the past twenty years or so, or to New York's South Street Seaport, or other 'historic ports,' you've likely got it already. If not, just imagine your favorite up-scale mall moved to the edge of the ocean.
I mean...well... sheesh!
Which is not to say there's nothing to see and nothing to think about; it's there. here and there. Take this monument whose inscription tells a story few know: The billions of 9- to 11-inch fish were pumped ashore from the boats through underwater hoses that had to be maintained by divers when they became clogged with fish or developed leaks.
Or the Cannery Row Monument, installed in 2014, which pays tribute to Steinbeck at the top, Ed Ricketts at the bottom, and between them an assortment of Steinbeckian characters and men who helped create the gentrified Cannery Row of today.
So, let's go back to the history that called Cannery Row into existence. Fishing in Monterey Bay starts with Native Americans, obviously; the first new group to make fishing their mainstay were Chinese families in the 1850s. Later in the century, the railroad arrived, along with families from Portugal, Japan and Italy.
The big growth came after 1900, when the first big cannery sheds started to spread along Ocean View Avenue, with piers extending out into the water. And the sardines came flooding in, mostly 'pilchards,' 9 to 11-inch sardines, not the tiny ones from Norway.
In the beginning, small 'Monterey Clipper' boats, like the one at left above worked the bay, but later larger purse-seiners (right) went out with nets that could be a quarter-mile long, vastly increasing the catch. On shore, the cannery assembly lines gutted, cleaned and prepared the fish for canning.
Not all the fish was canned; at times the majority was turned into dried fishmeal for use as fertilizer. That meant it was ground, centrifuged to extract fish oil (sold separately!) and then roasted in these huge rotary ovens. They are the reason for the local saying: "Carmel by the sea, Pacific Grove by god—and Monterey by the smell."
Of course, all those piers, and all that oil sometimes led to disasters, such as this 1924 fire caused by a lightning strike on oil tanks.
In both World Wars, canned fish from Monterey played a big role in feeding troops and civilians around the world, but it may also have played a role in the final collapse of the industry through overfishing: Catches declined after 1945, the year Steinbeck's novel was published, and nearly all the canneries closed within ten years.
And for our last story, we turn to Ed Ricketts, 'Doc' in the novel and film. He's portrayed by Steinbeck as mostly a loner, but friendly with all the assorted local characters. A man with education and connections beyond Ocean View Avenue, but also very much a part of that world.
Ricketts ended up on Cannery Row in 1923 to start Pacific Biological Labs. The lab collected, prepared and sold specimens for teaching and research. He was a trained zoologist who left the University of Chicago before his degree and spent some years as an academic wanderer.
He was noted as a pioneer in studying life at the water's edge; his book Between Pacific Tides is still a classic in the field, although it almost never made it to print—the manuscript was mailed to the publisher only a short time before a cannery fire next door to the lab destroyed much of his notes and specimens, as well as his poetry collection.
He and Steinbeck became close friends in the early 1930s; Steinbeck and his wife Carol even worked in the lab when funds for staff were short. Steinbeck paid for reconstruction of the lab after the fire and became a silent partner. He also used Ricketts as the model for other characters in his novels, including Doc Burton in In Dubious Battle, as Jim Casy in The Grapes of Wrath and as Doctor Winter in The Moon is Down. Ricketts was reportedly not happy with his portrayal in Cannery Row.
After Ricketts' death in 1948, the lab closed and the building was sold to a local Chinese grocer, who had also been a significant character in Cannery Row. It was later purchased by a group of prominent friends, many of them artists and writers, who restored it as a clubhouse for themselves. Among the members was Hank Ketcham, creator of Dennis the Menace.
These days, it belongs to the City of Monterey, and it has a neighbor Ed Ricketts would have been proud of: The Monterey Bay Aquarium.
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