Life on the Water: Chris Wright

As a 4^th generation fisherman and starting his fishing career at 15 during the summers with his father, Chris Wright would work on the fishing boats while on break from school. Eventually going to college, Wright kept the tradition of fishing in the summers to support himself. 

Wright now runs three fishing boats, one of which his father used to manage. The balance between family and work is often a struggle for many fishermen, Wright has a three-year-old daughter and most of the time the responsibility has fallen mostly to his wife.  

“My wife knows this, and my daughter is starting to understand this but the first day I’m back it’s like I’m there but not really there,” Wright said. “We joke about it all the time, but it is like we have to turn-on and turn-off the “fishing switch” because there are ways, I act that I would never want my wife to see.”  

The fishing industry is full of stereotypes that are often depicted through movies such as “The Perfect storm” and others depicting the fishers as drug-addicts and brutal men with minimal morals.  

“When people think of the fishing industry, they think of like the 1980’s scene where everyone is on drugs but really most of us are family men, everyone except one has kids,” Wright commented. “For a lot of us this is the income that gets as good as it gets.” 

Defeating the stereotypes is just another job for the fishermen while trying to earn a living and balancing time between being out on the water and family.  

“They think about the guy shooting heroin on the dock, not the doctor stealing prescription drugs, because a white collar wouldn’t do that but a blue-collar would.” said Wright.  

Wright, like every other parent, wants better for his daughter. Wright’s daughter, like her father, has grown up on the waterfront, being a proficient swimmer and meeting her father’s crew members before having a fully developed memory, the fishing lifestyle has been intertwined with her life. 

“it’s not that I’m against it, it’s just a tough way to make a living,” said Wright. “It would be especially tough for a woman in a male-dominated industry.”  

Wirght, an engineer by trade prefers his daughter to have an easier life than he did, and that means discontinuing the family fishing tradition. 

“I would hope that my daughter could use her brain and not her back” commented Wright.  

As the fishing scene changes many fishermen are starting to have concerns for the future of their industry and Wright Is not any different. These include the fight against consolidation, permit stacking and wind farms.  

The windfarms have come up as the biggest current battle for fishermen currently, as concerns of ruining the ecosystem they depend on is something none of them want to do.  

“Nobodies a bigger conservationist than fishermen,” Wright stated. “Why would we want to deplete out own fishery and put ourselves out of work, we’re complaining because we don’t have enough work.” 

There are FIve windmills already out in the water and from the observations of Wright,they are constantly leaking oil into the water, creating a harmful and dangerous environment for not only the fish and water, but also the fishermen currently working on the water. Not stopping with the environmental concerns, Wright also mentions that if thousands of windfarms are placed in the water there will be a need to create traffic control that will eventually run the risk of boats crashing into them.