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The Sea Wolf and the Salty Dog

Historian Don MacGillivray explores the fascinating life of Captain Alex MacLean, the Cape Bretoner behind Jack London’s classic adventure The Sea Wolf

If you’re a book fan you could well be familiar with Jack London’s adventure novel The Sea Wolf, and its fierce colossus of a title character, Captain Wolf Larsen.

What you might not know is that Larsen was based on a real-life sea captain from Cape Breton.

In his new book, Captain Alex MacLean, Don MacGillivray follows the true story of the man who inspired a turn-of-the-century bestseller. It is a labour of love that will interest book-lovers, seafarers, marine historians, native Cape Bretoners, and those simply curious about one of the more colourful characters of the period.

Dr. MacGillivray, a professor of history at Cape Breton University, took 20 years and two sabbaticals to research and complete the new book. What he had started as a small article blossomed into a full chronicle of the 35 years that Captain MacLean sailed the Pacific Ocean.

The late 1800s were an age of great opportunity for mariners. From 1879, MacLean captained three ships with crews largely made up of Cape Bretoners, and his achievements and adventures made him a folk hero of the day. At the height of his fame, MacLean’s reputation extended from the waterfronts of Victoria down to San Francisco.

MacGillivray says Alex MacLean was a product of his roots: many of his Cape Breton contemporaries sought their fortune in the seal trade and other maritime activities, including MacLean’s brother, who accompanied him on many voyages. MacGillivray also notes that the cultural context of outmigration is still familiar to Cape Bretoners today.

The story holds a special interest for MacGillivray, who lives in Big Pond, close to MacLean’s former home of East Bay. Even to this day there are local ties with the captain: many of his relatives still live in the area.

MacGillivray says that one of the most challenging aspects of the research was the blurring of the real-life Captain Alex MacLean with the tales that grew up around him. MacLean was famous for his many escapades even before Jack London’s novel was published. He was, for instance, heavily involved in the Bering Sea Dispute, a sealing incident that brought the United States and Britain to the brink of war.

To confuse matters further, MacGillivray would often hear stories about MacLean, and later find that they had never occurred, or were actually legends told about the fictitious Wolf Larsen. He says the difficulty in separating fact from fiction was one of the main reasons for the length of the project.

MacGillivray conducted an enormous amount of archival research, including the analysis of courtroom records from both Canada and the United States. He also searched for photographs, which were often difficult to find—although useful resources were sometimes in the most unlikely of places. He recalls an old saloon on the Oakland waterfront with the colourful name of ‘The First and Last Chance Saloon’. Entering the saloon, which was as out of the way as could be, he noticed an old photograph hanging on the wall. On inspecting it, he found that it was a well preserved photograph of Captain Alex MacLean.

Such happy accidents are a blessing to every historian. As MacGillivray points out: “Sometimes, you never know who your good sources are.”