Mare Island

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Project Notes

I've been taking pictures in a place called Mare Island. For some reason it reminds me of what John Szarkowski said about the purpose of photography being “the precise and lucid description of significant fact." That’s always seemed right to me, although I’ve never been quite sure what he meant by “significant fact.”

As for Mare Island, in 1844 in the Mexican state of Alta California a horse belonging to General Mariano Vallejo fell from a raft into the waters of the Carquinez Straits. When the horse saved herself by swimming to a nearby island, the General named the island Isla de la Yegua, or Mare Island, in her honor. Soon afterward, the United States declared war on Mexico, and Alta California became the State of California. Isla de la Yegua, in turn, became the Mare Island Naval Shipyard.

Over the next 140 years, more than 500 naval vessels, from nuclear submarines to Swift boats, were launched from Mare Island. At its peak, its 996 buildings sprawled over 4,351 acres with four dry docks, 20 ship berths, two shipbuilding ways, three finger piers, 21 large industrial sites, a school, two day care centers, a medical clinic, three fire stations, a golf course, two athletic fields, three swimming pools, nine tennis courts, riding stables, and 416 housing units.

The shipyard closed in 1996, and Mare Island is a strange and desolate place today. Although toxic waste is widespread, new homes have been constructed and sold in the open space on the west side of the island. To the east, in some of the old shipyard buildings, there is commercial activity, the exact nature of which is unclear. A few of the former administration buildings are occupied by, for example, Touro University, the United States Forest Service, and the Veterans Administration. Most are vacant.

Usually when people speak of a significant fact, they mean, simply, something important. I don't think that's what Szarkowski meant. Instead, I think his reference was to facts with emotional content, facts that signify some aspect of what life feels like. It may be that not every fact, or every thing, has that capacity. But Mare Island is a place the facts of which are significant to me in the sense I think Szarkowski meant.

On the other hand, I know that sometimes the hardest thing is just to show honestly how a thing looks. So I'm not saying I think I'll succeed in photographing these facts lucidly, or with precision. But I'm trying.

(Posted June 19, 2008)