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A brief history of brine
Taste for seafood, lobster evolves over time
Lobsters are a favorite food on the Maine coast for visitors and residents alike. But it was not always so.
Even lobster “pound” restaurants are a relatively new phenomenon, and the expense of a lobster dinner — evidence of the power of supply and demand — belies its humble past.
“Lobsters were so plentiful in colonial times that many indentured servants had it stipulated in their written agreement that they would not be fed lobster more than two times a week,” said Captain Ted L. Spurling Sr., fisherman and longtime resident of Islesford. “It wasn’t that they disliked eating lobster, but it was simply such a cheap, plentiful food source that servants feared their employers relying on it. Too much of anything can become tiresome, or even sickening.”
According to an article by John D. Davis in the November 1968 issue of Down East magazine entitled, When lobsters were two cents each, the “old chronicles” recorded that lobsters were so plentiful that “settlers and indians caught them only ‘to baite their hookes withall, and to eate them when they can get no bass.’”
Apparently the appetite for lobster developed slowly because it was not until 1840 that commercial lobstering became an established part of the Maine fishing industry, Davis said.
Capt. Spurling reported that fishermen made their livings from finfish and clams — more than lobster — throughout much of the 19th century.
An early government report on “the Fisheries Industries of the United States,” cited in the Down East article, recorded that an early entrepreneur, Captain E. M. Oakes, began buying lobsters in Harpswell, Maine, and selling them in East Boston in 1841 — marking the beginning of commercial lobstering.
Lobstering season at that time ran from March 1 to July 4, reported Davis. After that, said one report, “lobsters were unfit for eating, and the black lobsters, or shedders, were even considered poisonous.”
Spurling pointed out that other seafood, such as clams, were also common in the 19th century. “People who lived near the ocean were better off in hard times,” he said. “One could farm, as was also done farther inland, but in lean times, there were always lobsters, clams, fish and even seabirds to feed a family.”
Other merchants began to traffic lobsters, seeing how profitable a business it could be. One Connecticut man, a Captain Chapell, hired four fishermen in Penobscot Bay, and each supplied him with 1,200 to 1,500 marketable lobsters every 10 days. In his article, Davis reported that the going price for lobster was 3 cents per lobster (not per pound) in March, 2.5 cents per lobster in April, and 2 cents per lobster in May and June in the 1840s. Lobsters averaged around three pounds, and any measuring less than 10.5 inches (total length) were rejected.
Commercial lobstering spread Down East, reaching Isle Au Haut and Swans Island in 1850, Deer Isle in 1852 and Matinicus Island in 1868.
Winter lobstering also began in 1845, Davis said, when a couple of Harpswell fishermen were induced to try winter fishing by being offered $4 per 100 marketable lobsters caught. The following winter they went on strike, “demanding to be paid by the pound,” and a rate of $1.12 to $1.25 per 100 pounds was agreed upon, and this rate reportedly stayed in effect for several years.
Lobsters were marketed in three ways — live, boiled and canned. The first cannery appeared in Eastport in 1840, and proved to be so profitable that within some years other canneries sprouted up in Carvers Harbor, Harpswell, North Haven and Gouldsboro. A cannery opened in Southwest Harbor around 1880, Spurling said.
These boom businesses were already experiencing problems in the latter quarter of the century, however, due to a shortage of lobsters. The public began to realize the extent of overfishing, and demanded protective legislation.
Prior to 1879, canneries were permitted to pack all year, although most restricted their operations to two seasons: April 1 to Aug. 1, and Sept. 5 to Dec. 1. Legislation was enacted in 1879 that limited canning to the first season, from April to August, and later laws further limited the season and the minimum size requirements. Because canneries relied on smaller lobsters for their purposes, the minimum size requirement forced them to close, explained Spurling.
About 9,500,000 lobsters were canned as late as 1880, but by 1895, the last cannery in Maine had closed down its operations, according to the article.
By 1898, the price of lobster had risen to 7.5 cents per pound.
Then, as now, Spurling noted, the public looked to legislators, and laws for conservation were put in place. Licensing for lobstermen was made compulsory in 1917, and in 1933 the range of allowable size was limited to 3 1/16 inches minimum, 4 3/4 inches maximum, measured around the carapace, or shield, on the back of the lobster, said Spurling. Today, the legal size is between 3 1/4 and 5 inches.
Overfishing is still a concern, although now it is particularly groundfish stocks that are endangered. But methods of lobstering and fishing have changed dramatically. Wind- and steam-powered boats have been replaced by diesel-powered engines, and more efficient, modern methods are used to locate, catch and transport lobsters.
In 2000, Maine lobstermen caught and sold 44 million pounds of legal-size lobsters.
A quote from U.S. Fish Commission agent John N. Cobb in 1901, more than a century ago, has a very contemporary ring: “For some years past the condition of the lobster fishery of New England has excited the earnest attention of all interested in the preservation of one of the most valuable crustaceans of our country. In the State of Maine, particularly, where the industry is of the first importance, the steady decline from year to year has caused the gravest fears, and incessant efforts have been made by the United States Fish Commission, in conjunction with the State Fish Commission of Maine, to overcome this decline.”
And for those tempted to wish for the days when lobsters were but two cents each in a time when houses lacked indoor plumbing and fishermen used motorless boats, think twice before expressing your thoughts to a modern lobsterman.