July 30, 2013 — The following was released by the New Bedford Working Waterfront Festival:
WORKING WATERFRONT FESTIVAL SET FOR SEPTEMBER
2013 Festival Dates September 28-29
FESTIVAL OVERVIEW
More than simply a celebration, the Working Waterfront Festival is a unique opportunity for the public to get a firsthand understanding of commercial fishing culture and for the fishing community to tell its’ own story. The free, family friendly event presents all that goes into bringing seafood from the ocean to the table in a way that is hands-on, educational, and fun.
THE BASICS:
– Dates: September 28-29
– Location: New Bedford’s Historic Waterfront (Fisherman’s Wharf, State Pier, Steamship Pier)
– Hours: Saturday 11-6, Sunday 11-5 (whaleboat races Saturday 8-12)
– 2013 is the 10th year of the event
– Festival is held rain or shine with most events under tents
– Festival is presented free of charge
– Parking is free of charge (Elm Street Garage)
– Full details available at www.workingwaterfrontfestival.org
2013 THEME
The 2013 Festival marks the ten year anniversary of the event and provides us with an opportunity to consider how commercial fishing and coastal communities have changed over the past ten years and what lies ahead. Festival programming will offer a retrospective look at the themes explored over the past decade: Sustainability; Safety at Sea; the Future of the Industry; Women in the Industry; Preservation of Ports; Fishermen & Farmers; the Cultural Mosaic of New England’s Working Ports; Tradition & Innovation; and Narrative Tradition.
CELEBRATING 10 YEARS
In celebration of our 10th Anniversary, we invite you to join us Friday, September 27th for A Festival Sampler: Celebrating 10 years with 10 performers for $10. The concert takes place at the Whaling Museum Theater. Seating is limited. Tickets will be available at the door and through the Festival web site.
HIGHLIGHTS
– Man Overboard Demo: A dockside demonstration of how fishermen on deck must act quickly to rescue a crew member who has fallen overboard.
– Flume Tank: A 750 gallon flume tank will be on display at this year’s festival. The tank is used to carry out performance evaluations, gear tests, and other observations on newly developed or existing fishing gears in simulated underwater and near surface conditions.
– Seafood Throwdown: Two chefs compete to create a winning dish using a surprise seafood ingredient. The event highlights underutilized seafood and local produce.
– F/V Roann: Step aboard this fully restored wooden eastern rig, one of several working boats available for dockside tours.
– Fishtales Story Station: Have a good fish story? We’ll be collecting real life stories from fishermen and others in the industry at the Fishtales – Tent on Steamship Pier as part of our Community Documentation Project.
– Fishermen’s Contests: Groundfishermen show their skills in Saturday’s net mending competition while scallopers have their turn at the Sunday shucking contest. Both events take place at noon on the Steamship Pier Contest Stage.
PERFORMERS
The Festival brings together a unique array of music, storytelling, and poetry. Performances include traditional sea chanteys and music reflecting the fishing industry’s ethnic diversity as well as songs, stories, and poetry about commercial fishing and the sea often performed by musicians who work in the industry. This year, we showcase many festival favorites from the past nine years as well as a few new faces. Anita Best, who first performed at the 2007 Festival, returns to share traditional songs and stories from Newfoundland. Calico Jack’s music and spoken word celebrate the people, places and history of the Chesapeake. Crabgrass, featuring Daisy Nell, will provide old time music for a New England contra dance as well as traditional and original songs about the seafaring and ship building heritage of Essex, Massachusetts. The Rhode Island based Sharks Come Cruisin’ return with their unique sound which has been described as sea chantey punk. Joao Cerilo & Pilon Batuku will heat up the dance floor with traditional Cape Verdean funana and batuk music. Local legend Ana Vinagre performs Portuguese fado, a tradition which grew up in the port city of Lisbon and speaks to the Portuguese involvement in commercial fishing in the old country and the new world. SAMspill presents traditional music from Norway, honoring the Norwegian community which dominates the sea scallop fishery. Several performers who write from personal experience working in the industry are also on tap for the weekend including festival regular Jon Campbell who leads Something Fishy, a song/poetry swap of material created and performed by fishermen. Jon Broderick & Jay Speakman, west coast fishermen integral to the start of the Astoria Fisherpoets Gathering, make their first appearance at the Working Waterfront Festival. Also included in this group of poets are Dave Densmore, a working west coast fisherman; Charlotte Enoksen who grew up in a New Bedford fishing family and writes poetry from the home front; and Janice Marshall who will present parodies drawn from a life in the Maryland crab fishery. Festival favorites, Souls of the Sea, a Gloucester-based folk-rock trio performs on Saturday. The New Bedford Harbor Sea Chantey Chorus performs on Sunday.
FESTIVAL FOOD
The Seafood Hut will be serving fresh New Bedford fish and chips, fried scallops and clam cakes. The Newburyport Crab Company offers crab cakes, lobster rolls with drawn butter, and lobster mac n’ cheese. R. Shucks Raw Bar will have shrimp cocktail and little necks and oysters on the half shell. Destination Soups will be serving chowder, hot and cold soup and grilled cheese and tuna sandwiches. Café Arpeggio will be serving its’ own Home Made Ice Cream as well as coffee, pastries, hot dogs, and more. Flour Girls Bakery will be serving their deserts and treats. Del’s Lemonade will have two locations selling their frozen lemonade.
COOKING DEMONSTRATIONS
The Foodways Area (Pier 3) features cooking demonstrations by galley cooks, ethnic cooks, and professional chefs. Visitors are invited to learn the basics of preparing fresh seafood at home as well as ethnic approaches to seafood cooking and galley fare. On Sunday afternoon, two chefs will compete in a Seafood Throwdown in which they compete to create a winning seafood dish using a surprise local seafood ingredient which is revealed to them at the event and fresh, local produce. Chefs can bring three of their favorite ingredients and, once they discover the secret seafood, they get $25 and 15 minutes to shop the Festival Farmers’ Market for the remaining ingredients. After their shopping spree, they have one hour to cook and present their entry for the judge’s consideration. The contest will conclude with an opportunity for the audience to sample the dishes. The Seafood Throwdown is a collaboration between the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance and the Working Waterfront Festival.
FARMERS’ MARKET
Sponsored by edible Southshore, the Farmers’ Market (State Pier) features produce and specialty items from a number of local farms as well as informational booths. In addition fresh, local fish, scallops and lobsters will be available for sale.
FILMS
The Dock-U-Mentary Film Area (Pier 3) screens historic and contemporary footage taken at sea and on shore, chronicling the history and experiences of the working waterfront and the commercial fishing industry. Several short documentary films will also be shown.
AUTHORS
A number of authors will read from and sign their books on commercial fishing, fishermen, seafood, and boats. Books will be available for purchase at our Festival Store located on Pier 3. Participating authors include: Robert Demanche and Carrie & Donald Tucker The Last of the Fairhaven Coasters: The Story of Captain Claude S. Tucker and the Schooner Coral, Clark Snow Waltzing With Lady Luck, Walter Scadden The Legend of the Black Duck, Judy Dutra Nautical Twilight, Maria Lawton Azorean Cooking: From my family's table to yours, Karen Covey, The Coastal Table, Ladies Branch of the Port Society Recipes from Land and Sea, Brian Robbins Bearin’s The Book, Twenty Years of Bulkhead Wisdom, Quiet Smiles, Belly Laughs, and Good Ol’ Salty Tears. We are also pleased to present two children’s authors who will present their salty tales aboard the Schooner Ernestina with scheduled story times on both days of the event: Daisy Nell Captain Stan’s Foo Foo Band, The Stowaway Mouse and Rocky at the Dockside, and Meghan Lapp Fast Friends and Hello Stranger.
CONTESTS & DEMONSTRATIONS OF INDUSTRY SKILLS
Contests offer a unique opportunity to watch those who work in the commercial fishing industry show off the skills of their trade. All contests will take place on the Contest Stage (Steamship Pier). This stage will also be the site for presentations featuring the latest in safety related gear and demonstrating the “tools of the trade” associated with various types of inshore fishing and lobstering. This year’s contests include: Scallop Shucking, Fish Filleting, Net Mending, Link Squeezing, Splicing, and Survival Suit Races. In addition, visitors can watch whaleboat races and a tugboat muster from the On Water Activities Viewing Area at the head of State Pier. Learn first hand about historic and contemporary skills of the industry by visiting the industry skills demonstration booths (Steamship Pier) including: net making, knot tying, rigging, scallop dredge making, inshore fishing, wire splicing and more.
FLUME TANK
The Center for Sustainable Aquatic Resources (CSAR) at the Marine Institute at Memorial University, Newfoundland operates the world’s largest flume tank, which is 13 feet deep by 26 feet wide by 72 feet long and circulates some 450,000 gallons of water at up to six feet per second through a complex system of propellers, pumps and pipes to mimic the flowing ocean. The Institute’s smaller 750 gallon flume tank will be on display at this year’s festival through a partnership between the Marine Institute and GEARNET – Northeast Groundfish Gear Conservation Engineering & Demonstration Network. Local net designer Tor Bendiksen of Reidar’s Manufacturing has designed model nets for use in the tank. Visitors will be able to see a demonstration of scale model nets in the tank and talk with net designers, fisheries scientists and fishermen.
BIG BOATS * LITTLE BOATS
Model boat makers will display a variety of workboats in miniature. A full-sized Beetle Whaleboat, built this spring by the Beetle Boat Shop in collaboration with the New Bedford Whaling Museum and Mystic Seaport Museum, will be on display. James Beetle of New Bedford built over 1,000 whaleboats between 1834 and 1854. Many Beetle whaleboats were on the Charles W. Morgan whale ship. The Morgan is currently undergoing a major restoration at Mystic Seaport and is slated to return to New Bedford in 2014 with this whaleboat and eight others onboard.
TOURS
Vessel Tours
Don’t miss the opportunity to learn about the different types of fishing vessels first-hand by getting on board one or more of the vessels offering dockside tours and talking with the crew. Vessels offering dockside tours include: a scalloper, a steel dragger, a deep sea clammer, a Stonington dragger, and a tug boat. In addition, a Coast Guard vessel will be available for tours as well as Schooner Ernestina, a 108’ traditional schooner, the official vessel of the Commonwealth. This year we are particularly excited to welcome the F/V ROANN a fully restored wooden Eastern Rig vessel. Built in 1947, ROANN fished out of Martha’s Vineyard and Point Judith, dragging for flounder, cod and haddock.
Harbor Tours
Whaling City Expeditions offers 55-minute harbor tours departing hourly on both Saturday and Sunday from noon to 5 p.m.
ON THE WATER ACTIVITIES
Whaleboat Races – The Buzzards Bay Rowing Club presents whaleboat races from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday. Come cheer on your favorite team. Best viewing: head of State Pier.
Whaleboat Rides – Try your hand at rowing a replica whaleboat. Buzzards Bay rowers will be on hand to provide instruction at Coast Guard Park on Saturday from 2-5 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 5 p.m.
Tugboat Muster – Watch tugboats at work as they compete for bragging rights in hawser tossing and pushing contests on Saturday from 3:30-5 p.m. Best viewing: head of State Pier.
Mini Tugs – Several mini-tugs will present a parade of sail and some on the water antics as a lead up to the Muster on Saturday at 3:00 p.m.
BLESSING OF THE FLEET
The 44th Annual Blessing of the Fleet will take place on Sunday at 1:00 p.m. A time-honored tradition, the Blessing gives the fishing community an opportunity to celebrate and reflect on the successes of the past year and to ask that the Lord’s good blessing continue in the coming year to keep each vessel and its crew safe during each voyage.
KID’S ACTIVITIES
The Kid’s Activity Tent offers a boatload of make and take art activities Saturday and Sunday from 11 to 5 including fish prints, shell decorating, paper boat making and more. This area is staffed courtesy of the Art Education Program of the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth.
EXHIBITS
A number of industry related non-profit organizations and businesses have booths at this year’s Festival. The Maritime Artisans Marketplace features unique handcrafted artwork created by 16 regional artists.
For forty years, the Wharfinger building was the site of the city’s seafood auction. Today, in addition to serving as the Waterfront Visitor Center, the building houses a mini-museum commemorating the seafood auction and the City’s role in the history of the commercial fishing industry. The exhibit was created through a joint effort of the City of New Bedford, the National Park Service and the fishing industry.
FISHTALES STORY STATION
We are pleased to partner with NOAA’s Voices from the Fisheries Project to collect short stories on a variety of topics such as storms and close calls, unusual catches, workplace pranks, and tales from the home front. Fishermen and others from the industry are invited to visit the Fish Tales Tent located near the Contest Stage on Steamship Pier to have their story recorded. Stories will be archived and shared through the Voices from the Fisheries web site and Working Waterfront Festival publications and programs.
SPONSORS
The Working Waterfront Festival is supported by a diverse coalition of individuals, businesses and educational and cultural organizations. Producing Partners of the 2013 Festival are National Endowment for the Arts, Island Foundation and Whaling City Seafood Display Auction. Major support is also provided by The City of New Bedford, New Bedford Harbor Development Commission, SouthCoast Media Group, United States Coast Guard, New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park, National Council for the Traditional Arts and Massachusetts Cultural Council. The Festival is a project of the Community Economic Development Center of Southeastern Massachusetts.
The Working Waterfront Festival is a project of the Community Economic Development Center of Southeastern MA, a non-profit organization. The FREE festival, a family friendly, educational celebration of New England's commercial fishing industry, features live maritime and ethnic music, fishermen's contests, fresh seafood, vessel tours, author readings, cooking demonstrations, kid's activities and more. It all takes place in New Bedford, MA, America's #1 fishing port, on the fourth full weekend of September. Navigate to us at www.workingwaterfrontfestival.org.