Oceanography professor changes perceptions on marine environments
Betsy Cohen
Issue date: 10/24/08 Section: News
Sherman always held an interest in the ocean, but it wasn't until later when he dropped out of law school that he followed his passion.
Growing up around the Boston area, Sherman was inspired by the Boston fish piers.
"There was something sort of exotic about those vessels," he said. "All I could see was a dried net and a boat tied to a dock."
Later, as a student at Suffolk University Law School, he was inspired by a professor who "convinced me that studying to be a lawyer was going to be a dull, dry sort of thing and biology was going to be much more interesting and exciting. It was so dynamic that I just dropped the law and took every course they had in biology."
After receiving a degree in biology, he taught at an ecological sanctuary in western Massachusetts and took a job with the Audubon Society.
"Audubon contracted with the various school districts and they provided young innocent people like myself, and sent us around to spread the word about natural resources and ecology in those early days," he said.
During the late 1950s there was "a great scurrying around for anybody that could read, write and think about the oceans, because there wasn't a great big pool of experienced people," Sherman said.
Soon after, Sherman received a telegram offering him a position as a federal fisheries researcher in Woods Hole, Mass. He was responsible for finding out where every fisherman that docked at the Boston Fish pier had caught his catch.
"It took about six months before they would talk to me, because I represented the federal government and they have a great suspicion against the feds," he said. [But] because I was out there in minus 20-degree weather trying to measure fish, they finally decided, well, maybe we can talk to this guy after all."
Sherman left Woods Hole after about 18 months and returned to Rhode Island, where he received his master's degree on a Navy scholarship and specialized in the study of copepods and zooplankton.
Growing up around the Boston area, Sherman was inspired by the Boston fish piers.
"There was something sort of exotic about those vessels," he said. "All I could see was a dried net and a boat tied to a dock."
Later, as a student at Suffolk University Law School, he was inspired by a professor who "convinced me that studying to be a lawyer was going to be a dull, dry sort of thing and biology was going to be much more interesting and exciting. It was so dynamic that I just dropped the law and took every course they had in biology."
After receiving a degree in biology, he taught at an ecological sanctuary in western Massachusetts and took a job with the Audubon Society.
"Audubon contracted with the various school districts and they provided young innocent people like myself, and sent us around to spread the word about natural resources and ecology in those early days," he said.
During the late 1950s there was "a great scurrying around for anybody that could read, write and think about the oceans, because there wasn't a great big pool of experienced people," Sherman said.
Soon after, Sherman received a telegram offering him a position as a federal fisheries researcher in Woods Hole, Mass. He was responsible for finding out where every fisherman that docked at the Boston Fish pier had caught his catch.
"It took about six months before they would talk to me, because I represented the federal government and they have a great suspicion against the feds," he said. [But] because I was out there in minus 20-degree weather trying to measure fish, they finally decided, well, maybe we can talk to this guy after all."
Sherman left Woods Hole after about 18 months and returned to Rhode Island, where he received his master's degree on a Navy scholarship and specialized in the study of copepods and zooplankton.
