The Bellstone b THE BELLSTONE The Greek Sponge Divers of the Aegean One American’s Journey Home b MICHAEL N. KALAFATAS Brandeis University Press Published by University Press of New England Hanover and London brandeis university press Published by University Press of New England, 37 Lafayette St., Lebanon, NH 03766 ᭧ 2003 by Brandeis University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 54321 Includes the epic poem “Winter Dream” by Metrophanes I. Kalafatas written in 1903 and published in Greek by Anchor Press, Boston, 1919. The poem appears in full both in its English rendering by the poet Olga Broumas, published here for the first time, and in the original Greek, in chapters 11 and 12. “Harlem (2)” on page 161. Reprinted by permission of Harold Ober Associates Incorporated. From THE COLLECTED POEMS OF LANGSTON HUGHES by Langston Hughes, copyright ᭧ 1994 by The Estate of Langston Hughes. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. Title page illustration: Courtesy Demetra Bowers, from a holograph copy of the poem by Metrophanes Kalafatas. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kalafatas, Michael N. The bellstone : the Greek sponge divers of the Aegean / Michael N. Kalafatas. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 1–58465–272–1 1. Sponge divers—Greece—Dodekanesos—History. 2. Sponge fisheries—Greece—Dodekanesos—History. 3. Sponge divers—Greece—Dodekanesos—Poetry. I. Title. HD8039.S55552 G763 2003 331.7'6397—dc21 2002153371 For Joan, for the children, and for those so loved now gone b And don’t forget All through the night The dead are also helping —Yannis Ritsos, from “18 Thin Little Songs of the Bitter Homeland” The poem is like an old jewel buried in the sand. And now the time has come for it to be an ornament in the spirits and hearts of the people. —Writer Irene Voyatzi-Charalambi introducing “Winter Dream” at the Symi Arts Festival, 1996 Contents Genealogy of the Kalafatas Family of Symi • xi Chronology • xiii Prologue • 1 1. Hit by the Machine • 9 2. Protest • 32 3. Penelope’s Revenge • 53 4. The Poetics of Manhood • 69 5. Swallowing the Wind • 95 6. The Sponge Wars—Tarpon Springs, Florida • 121 7. Sea Fever • 162 8. Pearling in Australia • 195 9. Mousmoulo • 217 10. The Purloined Letter • 222 11. “Winter Dream” • 227 12. Kheimerinos Oneiros • 253 x Contents Epilogue: Windflower • 277 Bibliography. • 279 Acknowledgments • 283 Illustrations follow page 144. Genealogy of the Kalafatas Family of Symi Only names that appear in the book are included below, with the exception of several names added to help illustrate island naming tradition. A full listing of Kalafatas family names would be the size of the Rhodes-Symi telephone book. Andreas, b. 1790 John, b. 1822 Stamatis, b. 1816, Mayor of Symi George, drowned Michael Nikitas, drowned Andreas Michael Nikitas poet Metrophanes, b. 1866 Stamatis Theodoros John Nikitas George Georgios Nikitas, b. 1901 Froso gave rise to four cousins all named Commissa* Michael Kalafatas after their grandfather Nicholas Metrofanis Nikitas Michael Georgios Metrofanis* Fotini (Roberta) Anastasia (Ann) author Michael Nikitas, b. 1943 Vasiliki (Bessie) Michael Nikitas, b. 1920 Panagiotis (Peter King) Demetra Nikitas Michael, b. 1956 sons John and Daniel Michael Nikitas, b. 1996 Michael Theodoros Michael Stamatis (Michael Foreys) *Died in childhood Chronology b.c. 1180Traditional date for Fall of Troy (July 4). 480Aeschylus wins Athens drama festival. 334–323 Conquests of Alexander the Great. a.d. 95 St. John writes the book of the Apocalypse on Patmos. 410–1453 The Age of Byzantium. 1309 Crusader Knights of St. John take control of Rhodes. 1453 Fall of Constantinople to Ottoman Turks. Period of Tourkokratia begins when Greece was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, 1453–1821. 1522 Suleiman the Magnificent defeats Crusader Knights of St. John on Rhodes. Dodecanese islands come under Ottoman rule. 1566 Suleiman dies, leaving Constantinople Europe’s largest city. 1821–1829 Greek War of Independence. Dodecanese remain under Ottoman control. 1863 Deep-diving equipment introduced into the sponge fishing islands of the Aegean. 1876–1909 Reign of Sultan Abdul Hamid II, “Bloody Abdul.” 1904 Poet Metrophanes I. Kalafatas dies. 1905 500 Greek spongers arrive at Tarpon Springs, Florida. 1912 Italians seize Dodecanese from Turkey. 1914–1918 World War I. In 1917 Greece joins Allies. 1919 Allies encourage Greeks to retake Smyrna. The war with Turkey that ensues is disastrous for the Greeks. xiv Chronology 1940–1941 Italians and Germans invade Greece. 1944 Greek and British troops liberate Greece. 1947 Dodecanese “retroceded” to Greek administration. 1948 Dodecanese officially reunited with Greece. 1944–1949 Civil war in the north of Greece between Communist and U.S.-backed pro-government forces. Late 1950s Cultured pearl industry begins to be developed in Australia. Paspaley family, originally of Kastellorizo, will become the industry leaders. PROLOGUE One time the people tried to break the gear before its strength gained on the land, before its atrocities prevailed, its wings spread like today. The crowd had gathered of one mind, men, women, children in agreement, swarming the shore like angry bees, roads full of men and boys. A roar was heard in the cafes, let’s break the gear in storage! They were unyielding, very wild, railing against the gear like rabid wolves. And then the throng descended, and in five minutes destroyed breathing tubes and suits. —“Winter Dream” 2 The Bellstone discovery “The ideal traveler is a passionate pilgrim,” Paul Theroux has written. As was I in the eastern Aegean in the summer of 1997. A beautiful old poem, written by my grandfather almost a century earlier, had taken me on a remarkable personal odyssey from my home outside Boston to the Dodecanese islands of Greece. My grandfather had been a school principal and poet on the island of Rhodes. In 1903 he wrote a long, stunning poem about the plight of the valiant young sponge divers of these islands. By marriageable age, one-third of the young men of these sponge-fishing islands lay dead or paralyzed for life from “the bends,” or what physicians today call decompression disease. Alas, within four months of writing the poem, at age thirty-eight, the poet himself died, too young, on the operating table following surgery for mastoiditis. Gradually, in a story utterly American, all his children emigrated to the United States, my father among them. They brought with them the poem as their sole possession. My father would speak of it lovingly as I, uninterested, would back-pedal out the kitchen door with my baseball glove in hand, headed for the outfield, so desirous of being an American. In 1994, I took the poem to Olga Broumas, the poet-in-residence at Brandeis University where I work. Olga is a distinguished poet, with more than ten published volumes of poetry, and one of the major translators of Odysseus Elytis, the great Greek Nobel laureate poet. She was born in Greece on the island of Syros. Olga read my grand- father’s poem and said to me, “You should knowthat this poem is deeply beautiful; in fact, it is national treasure of Greece.” Immediately I began to read all I could lay my hands on in English about the sponge-fishing islands of Greece. I took up the study of Greek, a subject I had fervently avoided as a child. I traveled to Tarpon Springs, Florida, where for a century there had been a flourishing sponge industry run by daring Greek divers from the Dodecanese. I conducted oral history interviews in Tarpon with sponge merchants and sponge divers. I made newfriends over the Internet, like the anthropologist Russ Bernard at the University of Florida, who has Prologue 3 written about the sponge-fishing islands of Greece and went to sea with the divers, and Tom Buttolph, a physician-diver-researcher at the Naval Medical Research labs in Bethesda, Maryland, who studies de- compression disease for the Navy. odyssey But, still, I wanted to follow the story back to the Dodecanese, back to a place where everyone knew my name. Using the magic of an old Dodecanese name, I wanted to ask, in Greek, what I desperately wanted to know: Why had so many divers died or been paralyzed long after knowledge of proper deep-diving technique had become widely available? I, whose emigrant father had led the Greek contingent in marches in behalf of Sacco and Vanzetti, wanted to know more about the protests, about the men and women portrayed in my grandfather’s poem who had carried on a dramatic fight to ban the use of deep- diving equipment. And most of all, I wanted to know why my grand- father, who had taken up pen against the powers-that-be, uttered as his last words: “They have killed me.” And so, on the occasion of my thirtieth anniversary of employment at Brandeis, I was graciously granted a six-week sabbatical by the University to followthe story to the Aegean. Fortuitously, my wife, Joan Furber Kalafatas, was leaving one job and not due to start her new job for six weeks, so we were able to travel together. Over the next six weeks—amazed—I watched people weep at my grandfather’s words nearly a century after he wrote them. I met with old-time divers and with the widows and children of divers who had perished in the sea. I palpated nitrogen bubbles still lodged in a diver’s leg twenty-five years after he had been “hit by the machine,” as divers intriguingly call the bends, and sawthe broad black streak across his chest from the negative tissue it created.