I should just quote Dan Duane's handling of this fine book in his Caught Inside--this fine book by educated Easterner Dana, college boy turned deckhand--but I won't. Wonderful guidebook through the world of a crewman as Dana ships out from the East Coast all the way down and around Cape Horn, up to California, and back. The chapters regarding California in the 1830's are classics, worthy of attention in a non-fiction English class treating local materials--though by "local" I must be including Santa Barbara and the Southern California coast. (Just as Duane does, I particularly like Dana's education via the Hawaiians' "work ethic": If we have enough money now for food, drink, and fun, why would we work?) California was part of Mexico at the time, and that aspect alone can provide the basis for good discussions into what students understand of California history. (I'm still looking for that Amazonian tribe and its queen that gave California her name.)
My parents believed in educating us even in our choice of comic books, and I first encountered Dana's story at a very young age through Classics Comics. I recall being captivated by the illustrations and dialogue presenting the tossing of cattle hides from clifftop to beach and then shouldering the hot, heavy hides through the surf out to a waiting boat. Why not throw those hides off the cliff instead of carrying them down? That seemed like an amazingly good question to ask, for me, at age 10 or so. (Years later, as an abalone diver on the North Coast, I'd remember this panel from the comic book and toss my own heavy lead weightbelt from the bluff down to the tideline. More recently, I tracked down a copy of that comic book and found those illustrations pretty much as I recollected.) In my 20's, I read Dana's narrative because Melville had read it and been influenced by it, and I kept the book on a shelf for revisiting.
P.S. In the Classics Comics version, the Hawaiians are edited out and replaced with Mexicans; I guess a comic book wouldn't have enough room to explain how Hawaiians were to be found working in Mexico's California. Still, the culture clash of work-driven 'Mericans and laid-back "natives" remains almost intact. Recall: Dana wanted to highlight the racism and cultural incomprehension that is so reprehensible.
