“A historian should have a little bit of domain knowledge,” said Mark J. Gabrielson. “If you know nothing about your topic, you’re going to have a lot more to investigate. If you know a little bit, it really helps.”
“It was the perfect storm.”
That’s how Mark J. Gabrielson, a 23-year Ridgefield resident, describes the elements that led him to write his first book, Deer Isle’s Undefeated America’s Cup Crews: Heroes from a Downeast Island.
There was sailing, which Mr. Gabrielson has done since he was three years old. There was Deer Isle, Maine, where he and his family spend time when they are not in Ridgefield or Boston. And there was history, one of Mr. Gabrielson’s lifelong passions.
“All these things came together,” Mr. Gabrielson said. “That’s what made it so much fun to write.”
The book, which came out this April, tells the true story of 40 Deer Isle sailors who were recruited to compete in the America’s Cup sailing tournament.
“It’s a great story,” Mr. Gabrielson said. “It’s got a beginning, middle, and end. It has a happy ending.”
The book is available at Books on the Common.
He thinks his background helped him to write the book.
“A historian should have a little bit of domain knowledge,” he said. “If you know nothing about your topic, you’re going to have a lot more to investigate. If you know a little bit, it really helps.”
“We went sailing as kids. It made me understand the challenges these guys from Deer Isle were facing, how difficult it was what they were doing.”
Mr. Gabrielson began research in early 2011. “The principle problem was knowing when to stop researching and when to start writing,” he said.
He gathered a huge amount of information during his research, using archives at Mystic Seaport and the New York Yacht Club Library, as well as Deer Isle itself. Mr. Gabrielson was also able to talk to historians and use the museum archives at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I., where he works as a research intern.
The Department of Maritime History is crucial at the college, Mr. Gabrielson said, because “a lot of what we do today relies on what we did in the past.”
He also used knowledge from his studies at the Harvard University Extension School, where he is concentrating in history.
He decided to go back to school after working in business for 33 years. “I had done multinational, I had done venture capital, I had built a company and turned it around. I got to the point where I said, ‘I don’t know what else to do in business’.”
“We were in Boston,” he said. “And I thought, ‘What does Boston do well? Educate people.’”
Mr. Gabrielson will be completing his degree this year.
He doesn’t see himself going back into business. Instead, he’s decided to “have a whole lot of fun taking one thing very seriously.” For now, that thing is maritime history.
“You have to focus on something in history,” Mr. Gabrielson said. “Otherwise it’s just so vast. You have to define what your sandbox is and then play in it.”
“Maritime history tells us a lot more than we think,” he said. Even so, there’s currently a “lack of interest” in the subject.
“People think less about the ocean,” he said. “Because one, they can fly across it in six hours, and two, it poses less of a challenge. It’s not a barrier, it’s a highway.”
Mr. Gabrielson argues that the ocean is still fascinating. He finds the concepts of “the ocean as a barrier, as an enabler, and how people behave on it and around it,” to be particularly interesting.
His readers seem to agree. “People really like the book,” he said. “Or at least, that’s what they’ve been telling me.”
Deer Isle’s Undefeated America’s Cup Crews: Heroes from a Downeast Island is avaliable on Amazon and at Books on the Common.
“Book on the Common has been very supportive,” he said. “Independent book stores are really important.”
To promote the book, Mr. Gabrielson is doing lectures and book signings, including events at Mystic Seaport, the America’s Cup Hall of Fame, and the New York Yacht Club. He recently spoke at the Ridgefield Library.
Now that the book is completed, Mr. Gabrielson feels “satisfied.”
“I’m eager to do another one,” he said.