Imagine leaving home at the age of 16 to earn your living in the cold North Atlantic. Imagine living on a 60-foot sailboat with 6 men. After sailing to Newfoundland, you must go out each morning in a dory (a small rowboat) to fish . . . and fish . . . and fish. No engine, no electricity, no GPS, no cell phone. You must depend upon the captain, your shipmates and yourself to survive. Many fishermen from your town have never returned. Will you be swept overboard? Lost in the fog? Run down by a steamship? Drowned in a storm like your grandfather? This is no imaginary life. This was the reality of men and boys from New England seaports in the 1800s. Molly Waldo! was inspired by the storytelling art of J.O.J. Frost, who went to the Grand Banks of Newfoundland in 1868, at the age of 16. When he was 70, he painted his memories on odd pieces of wood. The Frost paintings featured in this book are in The Marblehead Museum and Historical Society (along with logs, letters, and newspaper clippings that preserve the experiences of Marblehead fishermen). The experiences of those seamen are adapted in this tale of a young man s first voyage to the Grand Banks. Molly Waldo was the joyful shout exchanged when vessels from Marblehead met on the fishing grounds. Townsmen rowed over in their dories to see familiar faces, swap yarns and share messages from home. Now readers have a chance to join those courageous men who were the bedrock of early American seaports.