1 ARRIVING IN WOODS HOLE 



/A 



19 



•^ The drawbridge into Eel 

 Pond, with the MBL 

 vessel Dolphin coming 

 through. MBL Archives. 



seashore to get the fresh materials in sufficient quantities. The community 

 sense of life at the MBL stimulates the paiticipants. The relaxed atmosphere, 

 the sense of open conversation, and exchange of ideas appeal. Their children 

 love it. Above all, the MBL is a unique center for intense biological research 

 in a community of leading researchers. They all return. 



The Origin of the Marine Biotogicai Lt^oratory 



Why was Woods Hole the chosen location for the MBL? Actually, someone 

 who arrived before 1896 would have had to ask "why Woods Holl? " — its 

 official name until that time. Considerable debate about the name — whether 

 named by Norsemen or referring to a hill or someone's family name — 

 circled the small town. Then in 1896 the United States Post Office decided 

 that it would be Woods Hole, much to Whitman's annoyance as he had 

 named several local species "hollensis. " 



Woods Hole was chosen for the MBL location essentially because of 

 Spencer Fullerton Baird and Alpheus Hyatt, both immortalized by streets 

 named after them in Woods Hole today. Baird served as first (and unpaid) 

 commissioner of the U.S. Fish Commission, as well as secretary of the 

 Smithsonian Institution. He was the sort of fellow who would walk twenty or 

 thirty miles while a young professor at Pennsylvania's Dickinson College just 

 to get a book. When Baird saw Woods Hole in his search for a permanent site 

 for the Fish Commission, he recognized its strengths. As lifelong MBL 

 embiyologist Edwin Grant Conklin later put it, Woods Hole had wonderful 

 "natural advantages, " namely the "numerous harbors and lagoons, with 

 muddy, sandy, or rocky bottoms, while the coast is so broken by bays, 

 promontories, straits and islands as to afford the most varied habitats." In 

 addition, the tidal currents churn up the food and o:?^gen supplies in the 

 water and produce bountiful collections of organisms from the nearby Gulf 

 Stream as well as the northern currents. The freshwater ponds provide 

 alternative supplies for materials, Conklin noted. Enthusing further, he 

 suggested that you "add to these things the fact that Woods Hole is readily 

 accessible by rail or boat, that the climate in summer is delightful, the 

 bathing excellent, the mainland and islands charming, the sound with its 

 continual procession of ships always varied and interesting, and you have in 

 Woods Hole not only an ideal place for a laboratory, but also an ideal place 

 for summer residence. " Given that Baird had spent some time exploring up 

 and down the coast and that he shared Conklin's enthusiasm for this small 

 town (with its seventy-five buildings in 1871), it should not surprise us that he 

 chose Woods Hole for the Fish Commission operation. 



Full of energy and ideas, Baird wanted to build a major research center 

 in Woods Hole. He had local friends who encouraged the enterprise and 

 helped to secure the land, including a plot right across the street from the 



