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A Look at the GREAT CANNERY ROW REUNION 2005
(Topics and Presenters for the event on Saturday, October 8th.
Doors open at 9:00 a.m.—the program starts a 9:30 a.m.—and ends at 6:00 p.m.)
and here's a look at where we're going to be: the Steinbeck Lobby and
the Steinbeck Forum of the Monterey Conference Center.

rose bowl
  
   Meet Dottie Bicknell Sanchez, the daughter of "Gabe" Bicknell, John Steinbeck's admitted model for Mack in "Cannery Row." Take home one of her incredible "rose bowls" along with your memories of meeting and talking to wonderful woman with an "infamous" father—one of the Real Life stories you will hear from people like Dottie at the GREAT CANNERY ROW REUNION 2005.
Lewis photo
  
   Images from the incredible black and white photo collection of Cannery Row (1957-1958) by Robert Lewis (the Maritime Museum of Monterey major exhibit 2000-2001) will again be on exhibit. We owe Robert a great debt, indeed, for a look at an incredible view of the Old Row and its people before it rose again from the ashes of the Monterey sardine industry.
Hovden_thumbnail
    Partial sponsorship has been obtained for the Hovden cannery historical model exhibit from the Spirit of Monterey Wax Museum. Perhaps you or your organization can complete the sponsorship of this incredible exhibit. Bill Johnk, historical modeler from Boulder, Colorado, will exhibit his mid-1940s historical scale model of the Hovden cannery—destined for the Museum of California in Oakland. The City of Monterey owns his previous works: Pacific Biological Labs ("Doc's Lab) and the Wing Chong Market—all will be on exhibit only during the Reunion.
bob_enea    Mr. Bob Enea, historian and nephew of "Sparky" Enea of the Sea of Cortez voyage and its Steinbeck "Log"—presents an inside account of that trip, its Steinbeck implications and the origins of John Steinbeck's famous WWII novel about the Nazi occupation of Scandinavia (Norway): "The Moon Is Down."
   In a separate Great Cannery Row Reunion presentation, Bob also leads a Fisherman's Panel, "Harvesting the Silver Tide," with more information presented below.

Gilly's Cortez
  
   Prof. Bill Gilly, Hopkins Marine Station of  Stanford University, tells of the recent re-enactment of the 1940 voyage to "The Sea of Cortez" by Ed Ricketts and John Steinbeck. Modern science retraces the route of Monterey's "Western Flyer," back to the origins of the The Sea of Cortez. On the 1940 trip, John Steinbeck began his World War II classic The Moon Is Down.
eldon_mkh_poster
 
  Charter Board Member of the Cannery Row Foundation, Eldon Dedini, renowned cartoonist for Esquire, the New Yorker, and Playboy magazines, will be signing rare posters for the first Great Cannery Row Reunion in 1983. Shown with Foundation Executive Vice President and founder, Michael Hemp, during ceremonies at the Monterey Conference Center in 1983.
efr_bronze
    The last few of the 50 limited edition Ed Ricketts Memorial bronzes will be available at the Reunion. The 50 of-a-kind bronze replicas of the actual Ed Ricketts Memorial (sculpted by the memorial's sculptor, Jesse Corsaut) completes the cost of the actual memorial already in place on Cannery Row. Donors names will be cast on a plaque attached to the Memorial. Meet the sculptor, Jesse Corsaut, who also created the John Steinbeck bronze now owned by the City of Monterey, which will also be on exhibit.
label
 
   Mr. James Bridges (a member of the Cannery Row Foundation board of directors) shares the worlds' largest sardine and fish canning collection on his web site, www.sardineking.com — and will be making a presentation on The Art of Collecting Sardine Labels  and how you, or your children or school classes, can start collecting sardine labels for projects and as art.

cannery_line
   Joe and Doris Bragdon are former residents of the Old Row and are now docents at the National Steinbeck Center. Joe worked on the rebuilding of the Del Mar cannery after the fire that destroyed it—and the original Ocean View Avenue lab of Ed Ricketts—in 1936. The panel of long-timers, including Frances Low, Elizabeth Wheeler, Dottie Sanchez, and Abel Quinones, will recall "Life on Old Cannery Row" and work in the canneries.
Pat Hathaway Collection photo
scrap_thumb
   Mr. Scrap Lundy, historian and CRF Board Member, presents his incredibly detailed research on John Steinbeck's "Cannery Row"—Real People, Real Places in a chapter-by-chapter walk through the real data and material John used in his world famous fiction. Scrap Lundy's history of the Abalone is the standard in that realm and lead him to our Monterey abalone divers and then the untold story of the cannery divers, without which there may not have been a Row.
moon_down    Prof. Don Coers, Angelo State University, San Angelo, Texas, will explain the impact and significance of Steinbeck's wartime novel—for which he was awarded the Norwegian Haakon Cross of Freedom. Prof. Coers, the expert on this Steinbeck work, will  help unify the Norwegian theme with John Steinbeck As Propagandist: "The Moon Is Down." 
astro_thumb
    Prof. Richard Astro, Drexel University, Philadelphia,
Keynote Speaker at the first Great Cannery Row Reunion (1983), receiving a copy of the John Steinbeck portrait by Judith Deim after the Sea of Cortez voyage. Dr. Astro, among the very earliest to appreciate the influence of Ed Ricketts on John Steinbeck, will again deliver the keynote address at this year's Reunion.
crocker
   Mr. Piers Crocker, Director of the Norwegian Canning Museum at Stavanger (the actual "Sardine Capital of the World") leads the dual centennials of the arrival of Knut Hovden in Monterey (where he became the "King of Cannery Row") and Norwegian independence from Sweden—both in 1905. Mr. Crocker will share the history of the sardine canning industry we have in common and help establish a permanent bond between the "Sardine Capitals of the World." Stavanger is a "Euro City of Culture" in 2008.
japanese_salmon
   Mr. Tim Thomas, Maritime Museum of Monterey historian, will be presenting "I Wanted to be a Baseball Player: Frank Manaka and the Japanese Fishermen of Monterey Bay"—the largely unknown saga of Japanese fishermen and their crucial role in the development of the Monterey fishing and canning industry. The Cannery Row Foundation wishes to thank the Maritime Museum of Monterey for also providing free admission for Great Cannery Row Reunion 2005 attendees to their museum on both Saturday and Sunday, October 8th and 9th.
diver
   Mr. George Fraley, Pebble Beach, one of the last cannery divers in Monterey, will explain the crucial role in each season's canning industry preparation for the "Silver Tide." With the floating hopper unloading system anchored off each cannery, pipeline repair and maintenance and hopper anchoring were the dangerous lifeline the the canneries depended on—without these in operation there would be no fish coming ashore! Diving historian Scrap Lundy and Boardmember Sylvia Fraley and cannery diver George Fraley will help explore The Hard Hat Divers of old Cannery Row.
beyond_cannery_row
 
   Carol McKibben, historian, presents material from her new book, Beyond Cannery Row—Sicialian Women, Immigration and Community in Monterey 1915-1999, in an exploration of the role and impact of Sicilian women in the history of Cannery Row and the contemporary Monterey community.

marotta_83
   Legendary Monterey musician, businessman and community leader, Mike Marotta—who played at the first Great Cannery Row Reunion in May 1983—returns for a special appearance to make the Reunion complete with the "Music of Monterey and Cannery Row." His group played the early Cannery Row Reunions from 1983 though 1987 at the Conference Center, the Outrigger on Cannery Row and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Join us in a tribute to Mike Marotta!
king_oscar_red

   Mr. Bob Montano, President of King Oscar USA, San Francisco, is providing a Norwegian Sardine tasting and a complimentary tea towel (which also makes a good golf towel, we're told) for for all Reunion attendees. What a great way to celebrate—in good taste— the "Two Sardine Capitals of the World." 
ring
   Educator, Steinbeck authority, and Cannery Row Foundation board member, Art Ring, presents a fascinating look a "The Novel Ideas of John Steinbeck." The photo at left is from the Cannery Row Foundation's "Hopkins Marine Station Lecture Series" in 2002 that celebrated the dual centennials of the birth of John Steinbeck in Salinas and the 100th anniversary of the first canning shed on old Ocean View Avenue (later "Cannery Row"), also in 1902.
skippers_86
    Fishing historian, Bob Enea, presents a fisherman's panel called "Harvesting the Silver Tide"—about the days and dangers of being a fisherman in the Monterey sardine trade. Bob Enea and Michael Hemp are shown at left with Bob's "Surviving Skipper's" at the 1986 Great Cannery Row Reunion at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Click here for the full photo of all the skippers. Bob's Fisherman's Panel includes John Cardinalli, purse seiner New Hope, John Mercurio, purse seiner Mercury, and Mike Mairorana, purse seiner Dux.
review
   Prof. Stephen George, BYU-Idaho, the president of the New Steinbeck Society of America, will present an informational view of the Steinbeck world as published in the Steinbeck Journal, and the programs of the Society in the exploration, preservation and education of the themes and works of—by our way of thinking—America's greatest author. Steinbeck themes are as relevant today as they were at the time of the Dust Bowl migration, or the invasion of Norway in WWII.
radio
 
Click here for an Mp3 of the Great Cannery Row Reunion 2005 PSA (Public Service Announcement) on radio around the Central Coast in support of the Cannery Row Foundation's event.

Exhibits:

Pat Hathaway Photo Collection

Robert Lewis Collection (1957-1958)

Bill Johnk historic models of the Hovden cannery, the Wing Chong Market and Ed Ricketts' ("Doc's) lab.

"The Western Flyer" purse seiner by historic boat modeler, Mark Demaria.

Dottie Bicknell Sanchez ("Mack's" daughter)—Old-time (abalone) "Rose Bowls" on display and sale.

Original "Great Cannery Row Reunion" posters from 1983, for sale signed by Eldon Dedini.

Jesse Corsaut's bronze Steinbeck bust (acquired by the City of Monterey)

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