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About Cannon Beach gazette. (Cannon Beach, Or.) 1977-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 10, 2017)
Hunters Shipwreck Hunters 10A • February 10, 2017 | Cannon Beach Gazette | cannonbeachgazette.com ������� ���������������������������������������������������� of the Oregon Coast Shipwreck Hunters SUBMITTED PHOTOS Wreck of the Peter Iredale at Fort Stevens. Galena, near Gearhart, 1906. ‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡ †‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡†‡ Combing through history’s wreckage By Rebecca Herren EO Media Group E Ever have a fascination with shipwrecks? Did you ever wonder about the mysteries surround- ing their demise, stories of lost treasures, or about claiming the rights to abandoned wrecks? Maritime archaeologist Chris- topher Dewey does and during the Seaside Museum and Historical Society’s History and Hops lecture at Seaside Brewing Co. on Jan. 26, he answered questions to unravel a few mysteries and myths about shipwrecks. Dewey is a retired naval offi - cer, an adjunct instructor at Clatsop Community College and founder of the Maritime Archaeological So- ciety in Astoria. He is listed on the Register of Professional Archaeolo- gists and is a Secretary of the Inte- rior and Oregon State qualifi ed ar- chaeologist. If that wasn’t enough, he is a modern day shipwreck hunt- er in Oregon and Washington. Unlike trea- sure hunters, he searches for, in- vestigates and documents ship- wrecks and mari- time archaeolog- ical sites. He and Christopher Dewey a team of volun- teers search sites using side-scan sonars, a magne- tometer and a remote operating ve- hicle much like Robert Ballard used to fi nd the Titanic, the Bismarck and the USS Yorktown wrecks, but smaller. He does not salvage or excavate the wrecks he fi nds explaining, “I am not a treasure hunter, I’m not out there looking for ships full of gold doubloons. I am an archeologist.” Dewey jokingly says that he is oftentimes referred to as a garbage collector because he fi nds other peoples garbage and lost things throughout the world. “We search for material remains underwater.” According to Dewey, underwa- ter archaeology looks at shipwrecks and submerged land sites both his- torically and prehistorically, mean- ing Native American and the like. “Nautical archaeology,” he said, is not only about the ships, “it’s about the information that connects us to our past and it’s about maritime cultures.” One slide of Dewey’s presenta- tion revealed a photo of a bronze bow. “Entire areas in the Medi- terranean are littered with these bronze bows from galleons that sank during the many battles that took place there,” he said. An- other slide showed a row of ves- sel-like casks made out of terra cotta. “These are the only things left from this shipwreck from the Bronze Age.” The 40 to 50 casks found measure about 1-foot-wide by 2-feet-tall. This style of stack- able container held grains, oils and wine. Over the years, Hollywood has glamorized shipwrecks and trea- sure hunting in such movies as “The Deep,” “Fool’s Gold” and “The Goonies.” But who really owns abandoned shipwrecks? Up until 1988, divers could sneak around and salvage a few trinkets they found on abandoned shipwrecks. But due to the damage many historical wrecks received from salvaging, the Abandoned Shipwreck Act was signed into law. Shipwrecks embedded in lands in which they lie belong to the State including rivers, lakes and up to three miles offshore. An archaeological site, Dewey explains must be 50 years or older in the State of Washington and 75 years in Oregon. He discourages treasure seekers from making a site claim for excavation due to the mass amounts of paperwork and the amount of money needed for an excavation. “It’s expensive to claim an excavation site and by doing so many historical objects have been lost to private collections.” Sites around shipwrecks are as important as the artifacts. “If they had been lost into a private library, there would have been nothing left to see because the ship is gone,” Dewey said, referring back to the wreck with the containers. “So there is a good reason to leave arti- facts where they lie.” The shipwreck of the Peter Ire- dale is the most visible and well- known wreck on the Oregon coast. Located on Clatsop Spit, its skele- tal structure towers above the wet sands during low tide. Even though larger and more famous shipwrecks such as the Titanic and Peter Iredale are intriguing, Dewey said less- er-known ships that have wrecked in the region equally capture his attention. One such wreck was found on the Seaside beach in November 2014. Three men were metal de- tecting in the dunes and uncovered a large piece of wood. Dewey in- vestigated and sent his data and a drawing of a boat keel to the state’s archaeologist. After much research, the state concluded it was a 1950s trawler. It didn’t take long for the Cole- wort Creek boat to be identifi ed. The abandoned boat was located in the Lewis and Clark National His- torical Park and through word of mouth, a relative and a photo, the boat was determined to be a 1920s square stern gillnetter owned by a local man who transported milk from a dairy farm to the Astoria market. The ongoing Beeswax Wreck Project is a shipwreck near Ne- halem beach. The ship is thought to be the Santo Cristo de Burgos, a Spanish galleon from 1693 that wrecked sometime around 1700 between Cape Falcon and the Ne- halem Spit. OSU researcher gets up close and personal with gray whales By Rebecca Herren For EO Media Group Summer vacationers are not the only part-time residents of our region. About 200 gray whales in the Pacifi c Coast Feeding Group return every year. In- stead of migrating with the rest of the population north to the Bering Sea, they cavort for several months along Oregon’s coastline. Known as resident whales, animals in the group do not live in the area year-round. Tracking gray whales Oregon State University graduate student Florence Sul- livan studies gray whales. She is part of a research team for Geospatial Ecolo- gy of Marine Megafauna Lab or GEMM Lab, studying the Pacifi c Coast Feeding Group, gray whales that feed in the southern waters between northern California and south- eastern Alaska. At the Jan. 18 “Listening to the Land” lecture present- ed by the Necanicum Water- shed Council and the North Coast Land Conservancy at the Seaside Library, Sullivan noted that gray whales do not feed during migration, which makes the Oregon Coast an important habitat for them on their return migration to Alas- ka. The focus of Sullivan’s re- search is to document the for- aging behavior of the feeding group, document the effect of manmade disturbances, over- The researchers’ viewing location is concentrated be- tween Titchener Cove and Mill Rocks near Port Orford and Depoe Bay. The team uses a surveyor’s instrument called a theodolite to track and map the movement of individual whales as they for- age. The data collected shows the whales’ traveling patterns between kelp beds, how they search for food and how they interact with vessels. New research techniques such as Go Pro cameras and aerial drones benefi t the team to closely observe the whales’ patterns and behaviors, and hy- drophones aid in recording the ocean noise — natural, human and mechanical — whales be- come exposed to. In an effort to gain a better REBECCA HERREN/CANNON BEACH GAZETTE Florence Sullivan, center, discusses the “Watch Out for Whales” brochure with Lianne Th ompson, Jeff Gage, Ju- dith Pearson and Jim Border. all health, body condition and the whales’ response to chang- ing ocean conditions. After the fi ndings are com- pleted, Sullivan will work with local communities and whale-watching operators to create scientifi c guidelines for vessel operation in the pres- ence of feeding gray whales. understanding of the foraging ecology of the gray whales’ feeding group, the team col- lects samples of a particular prey called mysid. Mysids are small, shrimp-like crustaceans found near the kelp beds. “We think the reason they’re attracted to these for- aging hotspots along the Ore- gon coast is an abundance of mysid shrimp,” Sullivan said. “During summer months, the mysid can be really dense from the sea fl oor to the surface and really close to shore. We want to know if this wealth of for- aging is enough to get these whales to disrupt their migra- tion north, or is there some other mechanism that makes 200 whales act differently than the other 20,000? That’s what we hope to fi nd out.” We have the Sweetest Treats for your Valentine! N e w Full color, scenic montage postcards of Astoria now available at the Daily Astorian office! Pre-order CHOCOLATE DIPPED S STRAWBERRIE 4th for February 1 s) (limited supplie Valentine’s Day Balloons NOW Available!! Making Sweet Memories for over 50 Years! 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