MY SEAFARING HEARITAGE

Much of my seafaring DNA is from my father, the late Jack L. Hough, shown here as a Sea Scout on Lake Michigan out of Chicago in the 1920s.

My earliest memories as a toddler are of Woods Hole harbor in the mid 1940s (shown here at that time), where my father was a geologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and an at-sea oceanographic instructor for submarine officers.

After 6 month’s service as chief geologist on the final Admiral Byrd Antarctic Expedition in 1946, my father became a professor of geology and oceanography at the U. of Illinois (1947-63) and later the U. of Michigan (1964-73). As a young teenager I accompanied and assisted him in several field trips and cruises on UM research vessels. He is shown here near the end of his career on the RV Inland Seas on Lake Michigan. Dad taught me seamanship and sailing, and introduced me to the marine and freshwater sciences.

Part of my seafaring DNA came to me from the Vikings through my Swedish grandfather, the late Anton J. Carlson, who crossed the ocean in 1890 as a teenage immigrant and rose to scientific fame as a professor of physiology at the U. of Chicago (ca1905-1956). His initial landmark research was on the cardiac physiology of the marine horseshoe crab leading to the discovery of the function of the vagus nerve in humans. He built a log cabin on Elk Lake, MI, and taught me as a youngster to fish in his marvelous old wooden duck boat.