The sign reads:
"One Man, Two Worlds
Historic Cannery Row
Doc, the legend
John Steinbeck used his close friend and collaborator, Edward Ricketts, as a model for the famous fictional character Doc. In the novels Cannery Row and Sweet Thursday, set in the 1930s and 1940s, the kindly Doc is a gentle, insightful and observant philosopher-scientist who lives and works on the street that has become the world-famous Cannery Row.
Ed Ricketts, the scientist
Ed Ricketts was a serious and dedicated scientist. He researched the tide pools of the West Coast from Canada to Mexico, studying the interrelationships of marine species, and worked to develop an ecological philosophy of life. His book Between Pacific Tides, a pioneering sturdy of intertidal communities originally published in 1939, continues to be used by students of marine biology.
The Edward Ricketts Memorial
A monument to Ed Ricketts stands near Cannery Row, at the intersection of Drake Avenue and Wave Street. There, on the evening of May 8, 1948, while driving across the railroad tracks, Ricketts was struck by a train. He was nearly 51. Devastated by his friend’s death, Steinbeck wrote, “There dies the greatest man I have known and the best teacher. It is going to take a long time to reorganize my thinking and my planning without him.”
Wikipedia (
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"Edward Flanders Robb Ricketts (May 14, 1897 – May 11, 1948) commonly known as Ed Ricketts, was an American marine biologist, ecologist, and philosopher. He is best known for Between Pacific Tides (1939), a pioneering study of intertidal ecology, and for his influence on writer John Steinbeck, which resulted in their collaboration on the Sea of Cortez, later republished as The Log from the Sea of Cortez (1951)....
Ricketts was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Abbott Ricketts and Alice Beverly Flanders Ricketts. He had a younger sister, Frances, and a younger brother, Thayer. His sister Frances said of him that he had a mind like a dictionary and was often in trouble for correcting teachers and other adults. Ricketts spent most of his childhood in Chicago, except for a year in South Dakota when he was ten years old.
After a year of college, Ricketts traveled to Texas and New Mexico. In 1917 he was drafted into the Army Medical Corps. He hated the military bureaucracy but, according to John Steinbeck, "was a successful soldier."
After discharge from the army, Ricketts studied zoology at the University of Chicago. He was influenced by his professor, W.C. Allee, but dropped out without taking a degree. He then spent several months walking through the American south, from Indiana to Florida. He used material from this trip to publish an article in Travel magazine titled "Vagabonding." He returned to Chicago and studied some more at the university."