For Those Who Work the Sea (and Those Who Don't Return)

Updated below July 25 - My new song, "For Those Who Put to Sea," honors men and women who harvest the ocean's bounty and is sung in memory of those who sometimes don't come back. I just posted this fresh video version on YouTube and TikTok (and will post elsewhere soon). Please share this song with anyone who enjoys seafood or lives in a coastal community.

I shot most of the footage at the Maine Commercial Fishing Remebrance Day ceremony at the Lost Fishermen's Memorial in Lubec. There were 10 ceremonies up and down the 3,478-mile coast. At the event in Boothbay Harbor, Pat Shepard, the co-founder of Redde Marine Safety, narrated as a boat and crewman just off the dock demonstrated a valuable set of safety systems (video from Facebook).

Insert, July 25 - After the ceremony in Lubec, I interviewed Clarissa West, a lobster fisher operating out of Steuben whose father, Thomas West, died after evidently falling from his boat on April 21. He was one of two casualties, along with Stephen Johnson Jr., honored with the sounding of a hand bell at the ceremony as the chairwoman of the Lubec memorial, Annie Sokoloski, read their names.

Clarissa West said her children have started lobstering using her dad’s boat, the Aces and Eights:

Clarissa - I’m here in honor of my father. He just passed away in April 21st. He had fallen over. And we found him the 22nd, that morning. Actually, it was my brother that found him. We were up all night trying to search for him. The Marine Patrol was out in their boats. I was even in there with them to help. And we didn’t see him. There were fishermen that went out and helped look for him in his boats and shined the shores and the waters for us. And like the next day at three o’clock in the morning, my brother had found him. He was actually wrapped up in a crate. So I would say he tried to save himself. He got on a crate and then we don’t know if it rolled over. When it hit a rock or with the tide turn, and his hand was actually wrapped in it, and that’s what kept him afloat to bring him to shore.

He was 63. He just turned 63 on the 2nd of April. His boat was the Aces and Eights. He was doing his bait and fuel and was bringing it to his mooring, and we don’t know... If he fell off putting it on the mooring. We have no idea what happened.

Andy - People think of this as like a storm strikes a boat and it capsizes. But there’s all the other ways. All it takes is a little...

Clarissa - Just a little slip or mishap, I guess, so you never know what happens, really.

Andy - So what do you think of the idea of a Memorial Day, a Remembrance Day?

Clarissa - It’s good for everyone to gather, everyone that’s mourning, …and for our loved ones to be recognized together. And, well, it just brings us all together to know that nobody is alone. On the hard days, or on the day of... Because you never get over it. You really don’t. It’s just one day at a time, and you... Like I tell my kids, I said, we have the memories, we have the stories, and that’s what keeps him alive.

Andy - And what’s it like going out fishing, do you think about it when you’re out there?

Clarissa - Yeah, it’s hard… So we used to sail by each other all the time. And you don’t have that anymore. My kids actually took over his boat. I guess that gives a sense of peace for them to take over the tradition.

I’m using the song to raise funds for the Maine-based organization Green and White Hope, launched after the tragic loss of 18-year-old Tylar Michaud in 2023 and now working to boost safety for commercial fshing crews and shore-side responsiveness when the worst happens. My conversation with Liz Michaud, the organization’s founder (and Tylar’s aunt) is here:

Have a safe weekend, whatever you do. And if you enjoy some seafood, as I sing, “raise a glass and say a prayer for those who put to sea.”

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