Marine Biologist and Computer Sciences expert Dave Hamm was born in Minnesota in 1949. His father was in the Air Force and he traveled all throughout his childhood. He started college in Orlando, Florida and then went on to earn his Bachelors of Science at the University of West Florida, specializing in biology with a minor in statistics and mathematics. He went to graduate school at the University of South Florida and studied Computer Sciences. This allowed him work with both fishery management and database management within and for fisheries.

David McClellan was born on August 18, 1949 in Honolulu, Hawaii. He worked for NOAA at the Southeast Fisheries Science Center as a Fisheries Research Biologist for 37 years, conducting countless dives to gather data on the fisheries.

Interview contains discussion of: Southeast Fisheries Science Center, collecting fisheries data, NOAA divers, evolution and effect of data collection technology, benefits and disadvantages for working for a government agency, Reef Fish Visual Census Program.

David Packer received his undergraduate degree in zoology from Ohio State University. He started to become interested in marine biology and received his Master’s degree from the University of Maine in 1988. He is the editor of Essential Fish Habitat and studies deep sea corals.

Interview contains discussions of: Grain size analysis, dump site project, deep sea corals, benthic communities, EFH, species source documents, stock assessment, and ecosystem based management, Gulf of Maine deep sea coral, research cooperation between NOAA line offices.

David Pierce was born and raised in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Being from New Bedford, he had an interest in the ocean and the fisheries from a young age. He received his bachelors from SMU (Southeastern Massachusetts University) now University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. He also received his Master's in Marine Biology from SMU in 1982. He received his PhD from University of Massachusetts Boston in 1996. He began working for the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries in 1972.

Donna Wieting currently serves as the Director of the Office for Protective Resources at NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service. She has a B.S. in Animal Science from the University of Massachusetts and a Master’s in Marine Science from Louisiana State University. She has been at the agency since 1989 in various roles. 

Dr. Doug Lipton is currently the Senior Research Economist at NOAA Fisheries and a member of the Council of NOAA Fellows. He has a Bachelor’s in Biology from Stony Brook University, a Master’s in Marine Science from the College of William and Mary, and a PhD in Agriculture and Resource Economics from the University of Maryland. He started with the National Marine Fisheries Service as a Sea Grant Fellow in 1979 and was hired by NMFS as a fishery biologist before returning to school for economics. He also worked for Sea Grant as the national economics coordinator.

Edward DeMartini was born in San Francisco, California in 1946.His father died when he was four years old, and he was introduced to fishing when he was six by his cousin who acted as a surrogate father at the time. Ed says he was a natural historian at a young age and credits his mother with giving him the latitude to be an avid explorer and sparking his early interest in fish. Ed graduated with a degree in biology from the University of San Francisco in 1968, and a Master’s in Biological Oceanography in 1970.

Dr. Edward Klima was born on July 30, 1934, in Catskill, New York. He began working for the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries in 1962 as a shrimp biologist. He spent time in the Panama City Lab working on gear research before moving to the Pascagoula Lab. He spent 4 years in Washington D.C. where he worked on the drafting the legislation for the 200 mile limit which became the Magnuson Stevens Act. He returned to the Galveston Lab as the Lab Director in 1977 until his retirement in 1992.

Edwin Rhodes was born in Milford, Connecticut on March 4, 1943. During high school, he visited the Milford Lab to ask about a science project. He met Victor Loosanoff, the Lab Director, who became a mentor. Ed began working at the lab in 1959 as a high school junior and continued to work there until about 1970. After a brief break, he returned to the lab from 1971 to 1989. He rejoined NOAA as the Aquaculture Coordinator from 1997 to 2001. He has spent his entire career, both in the public and private sectors, working on aquaculture and shellfish. 

Dr. Emory Anderson was born on September 11, 1939, in Kenmare, North Dakota. He attended Dana College, majoring in Mathematics and minoring in Physics. After graduating, he became a high school math teacher. After two years of teaching, Anderson decided he wanted to pursue a career involving wildlife and the outdoors. He attended the University of Minnesota, where he first took preliminary science courses to prepare him for graduate school. During this time, he worked as a fish hatchery technician, encouraging him to pursue fisheries science.