THE 1800 s -(Cont'd) 



boat fishery is carried on by seven men from April until September, inclusive. 



Only three species of fish are usually taken, namely, scup, tautog, and sea bass. 



The total catch of each fisherman is about 15 barrels, or about 2,400 pounds. In 



addition about 6,720 lobsters are annually taken.". 

 Various vessels were placed at Baird's disposal to assist him in his research efforts. 

 A small steam launch was provided by the Boston Navy Yard; the New Bedford Custom 

 House provided a small yacht, and the U. S. Revenue Service made available two of their cutters. 

 The assignment of the 145-foot Coast Survey steamer Bachc to the Fish Commission provided the 

 capability of extending operations further offshore. The Navy, in 1873, placed the 100-foot steam 

 tug Bluelight under the jurisdiction of the Commission. This tug was sufficiently large to provide 

 an opportunity of trying, for the first time, the steam windlass for hoisting the dredges and trawls. 



Meanwhile from 1873 to 1875, the Nairangansett , under the command of Commodore 

 George Dewey, using a Congressional appropriation of $50,000 for the survey of the Pacific 

 Ocean, was employed in surveying a number of islands lying on or near the trade routes between 

 San Francisco and Australia and along the coasts of the peninsula of lower California and the Gulf 

 of California. The Tuscarora, a single screw sloop of wood construction under the command of 

 Commodore George Belknap, was the first ship equipped with a Thomson sounding machine. This 

 machine ("winch" would be more descriptive) contained 5,000 fathoms of piano wire used for 

 taking deep sea soundings and also for obtaining bottom specimens. During its two year mission 

 (1873 - 1874) to survey a cable route from the United States to Japan, the Tuscarora using the 

 Thomson device established two records, a sounding of 4,655 fathoms or five and one-quarter 

 statute miles and a bottom specimen from 4,356 fathoms, which was at that time the deepest ever 

 obtained. A broken wire precluded recovery of a bottom sample from the 4,655 fathom cast. 



The sounding machine used by the Tuscarora was the invention of Sir William Thomson 

 (later Lord Kelvin), professor of natural philosophy at Glasgow University, in 1872. He had tried 

 to interest his own government in its use to replace the age-old rope soundings and, in fact, is was 

 originally intended to so equip the British ship H.M.S. Challenger which was then being outfitted 

 for her famous research expedition. The new device, however, was not installed for as Thomson 

 stated "innovation is very distasteful to sailors". But the U.S. Navy was interested even though the 

 sounding machine had only been tested once by its inventor and the 2,700 fathoms test 

 sounding-obtained from a schooner in the Bay of Biscay-resulted in a crushed winch drum. The 

 Thomson sounding machine was used with much success onboard the Tuscarora and 483 casts 

 were actually accomplished. Much credit belongs to Commodore Belknap and his crew for their 

 ingenuity in correcting many design faults. The accomplishment of the Tuscarora in perfecting the 

 Thomson machine saw the end of rope soundings and the Navy's adoption of wire for deep sea 

 sounding. 



The 221-foot sidewheel steamer Gettysburg from 1877 to 1879 was assigned to collect 

 hydrographic information concerning the Mediterranean, and in 1879 the 164-foot sloop 

 Jamestown made a survey of the harbor of Sitka, Alaska. 



In 1877, the Coast Survey, inspired by the success of Britian's Challenger Expedition, 

 invited Alexander Agassiz, of the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology, to take charge of a 

 similar expedition using their steamer Blake. Agassiz, a Swiss-American scientist and mining 

 engineer, and son of the famed Harvard naturalist, Jean Louis Randolphe Agassiz, was a specialist 

 in marine ichthyology. Between 1877 and 1880 Agassiz, who was usually violently seasick, 

 conducted three dredging expeditions examining the physical and biological conditions of the Gulf 

 Stream and the waters around Cuba, Key West, Yucatan and the Tortugas. Eight years later a full 

 account of these dredging expeditions was published by Agassiz. 



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