Virginia Oliver is the oldest lobster harvester in Maine and probably the world: at 103, she still goes out to sea with her 80-year-old son, lobster partner. "I have to keep going. I want to do this until I die”
The Story
When the Great Depression hit in the late 1920s, Virginia Oliver, known as Ginny to her friends, was just 8 years old. From that moment on, her occupation wouldn't be studying times table or swinging on a swing. Instead, she would go lobster fishing in the seas of Maine, under the watchful eye of her caring father and older brother. Ninety-five years later, not much has changed except for the color of her hair. Putting on her fisherman's uniform, she climbs aboard the boat at sunrise and pulls up the traps.
Her father was a lobster dealer, who owned a general store on a smalll island called "The Neck" in the gulf of Maine. At a time when few women ventured onto fishing boats, Virginia took on the role of operating the boat. They would set sail together almost every day, and Virginia never considered giving up this life, especially after marrying a fellow fisherman named Max Oliver. With him, she continued to go out to sea for 61 years and raised four children, three of whom followed in the profession. "He used to tell everyone that I was the boss," she smiles. After his passing in 2006, her eighty-year-old son, Max Jr., took his place on the boat.
Together, they go out to sea three days a week, waking up at 3:30 AM, to empty their 400 traps and sell the loot, which they bring to the shop in a van. "I enjoy working with my son. I'm an independent woman," she asserts. The nine-meter-long boat bears her name, "Virginia"; she is the one who steers it, but she also takes care of measuring the crustaceans and tying their claws. And if she gets bitten occasionally, well, she shrugs it off. "There's no sense in complaining."
"When my husband was alive, lobsters were more plentiful," she observes. The likely cause is climate change, which has prompted the population to migrate northward. But Virginia doesn't give up; on the contrary, she has just renewed her license and can't wait to start fishing again. "I have to keep going. I want to do it until the end of my life. I've never had seasickness," she assures. Today, she is a celebrity in her town of Rockland and beyond. "Wherever I go, people stop me and talk to me, saying they've seen me on TV and so on." Credit goes to the documentary "Conversations with the Lobster Lady" by Wayne Gray and even a children's book, "The Lobster Lady," which tells her story. Author Alexandra S. D. Hinrichs sums up her message to future generations as follows: "Always do what you love."
Cover pictures: @Robert F. Bukaty -
Source: The Washington Post
