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Jack O'Brien

One day I looked up into the sun from our 24' Pro Line live shark collecting boat which just docked at the old CIA station on Grassy Key, FL Keys.
Two gentlemen hallowed in that bright light politely asked if my diver Wildlife Collector partner Gerrit Clay and I would like to join them searching for the second half of a Spanish Galleon lost in deep sands.

It was a surreal scene and the question matched. Gerrit and I looked at one another like two loggerhead turtles and replied: "We're involved capturing and shipping live sharks for display at the New England Aquarium in Boston. We can't drop what we were doing" Which at the moment was toting a six food shark in a stretcher".

Years later I saw the face of that bespectacled dreamer in the sun. It was Mel Fisher he had found that other half of the dream.

The next time I saw Mel I was skippering a 35 foot Mainship docked at Key West. I looked up from the cockpit and saw that same profile in the sun walking past. He was in the sun shroud again yet this time he had a bright green fist!. It turned out to be a rough emerald rock set to a thunderous gold ring.

I looked away and smiled knowing that such a dreamer will walk in that sunlight forever. Learn his lesson. The next time someone wants to join a dream, share the sun.

Jack O'Brien
Marine Wildlife Collector
New England Aquarium Diver
Nassau Seafloor Aquarium Curator and Director
Now a Boston Police Officer (retiring to follow the sun)

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