1-1 



This place without all question is the most pleasant and 

 healthful place in all this country and most convenient for habi- 

 tation . . . 



It aboundeth with all manner of fish. The Indians in one 

 night will catch thirty sturgeons in a place where the river is 

 not above twelve fathoms broad. And as for deer, buffaloes, 

 bears, turkeys, the woods do swarm with them, and the soil is 

 exceedingly fertile. 



From the Journal of Capt. 

 Henry Fleete, the first white 

 man to sail the Potomac 

 River, Washington, D. C, 

 1632. 



Man has had a long and intimate association with the sea. It 

 has borne his commerce and brought food to his nets; its tides 

 and storms have shaped the coast where his great cities have 

 grown; the broad estuaries have provided safe harbors for his 

 ships; and the rhythm of its tides has taught him the mathematics 

 and science with which he now reaches for the stars. 



Throughout recorded history the sea and its estuaries have 

 been used as a limitless resource; now, however, the impact of 

 man on his environment has taxed the resources of many estuarine 

 zones to the limit of endurance and reached into the depths of 

 the ocean itself. 



