June 13, 2013 — I also hope that the Gloucester Times is going to be able to find somebody that can pick up where Gaines left off. In the years I knew him as a colleague, I have also come to know the industry he covered. It deserves a reporter of Gaines' caliber. There is going to be a lot for the rest of us to do.
I had been on the fishing beat for just over nine months in 2010 when the fishing industry and local and state leaders during the Working Waterfront Festival presented the Friend of the New Bedford Fishermen Award to a reporter from the Gloucester Daily Times, Richard Gaines, along with his editor, Ray Lamont.
I could have watched the award ceremony while sitting at my desk, which has a window view of the waterfront.
But he had earned the award, so no hard feelings. I had years to go before I could even keep up with Gaines on the most daunting and complex reporting beat that I know of. Knowing this formed something of a challenge, because that old-school reporter had spent years digging out the secrets of not only the fishing industry but in particular the government apparatus that was misregulating it.
I had long since come to respect Gaines, who died last week of an apparent heart attack at his Gloucester home. He was 69.
Bob Vanasse, who runs the advocacy website Saving Seafood, told me Wednesday that with Gaines gone, "we just lost 33 percent of the fishing reporters" in the Northeast.
He was referring to Jay Lindsay of The Associated Press and myself, which was being kind. I also got an email from a Maine resident who told me that with Gaines gone, "you're the lead dog."
Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times