Page 242 - South Mississippi Living - September, 2018

THEFINALSAY ROBIN
DAVID
Executive Director, Maritime and Seafood Industry Museum
photo by Neil Ladner
Thirty years ago Mayor Gerald Blessey hired me to work at the Seafood Industry Museum. About three months later, he told me I was going to be the executive director. I had children, ages 3 and 1, and I argued with him that I could not devote
the time it was going to take to make the museum flourish
and grow — that I had two babies to raise. Well, after about an hour of arguing, I left as the executive director.
Boy, did my life become a whirlwind! My daughters grew up sleeping on blankets in my office during board meetings and other committee meetings, or they would join the meetings and color. They fast became museum brats.
I guess my first accomplishment was getting the first Biloxi Schooner, Glenn L. Swetman, in the water in 1989. In 1992, we started our first summer of Sea-n-Sail Adventure Camp for seven weeks.
Times were really tough at the museum, as well as all along the Gulf Coast; this was before gaming. The Museum Board wanted to possibly scrap the second schooner due to lack of funds to finish her. I insisted they give me the opportunity to borrow the money. They laughed and said go ahead and try, but no one will lend money on an unfinished boat. I secured the funding and in 1994 the second Biloxi Schooner, Mike Sekul, was launched. One of many highlights was having both schooners lead the first gaming paddle wheeler, the Isle of Capri, to Point Cadet.
We started our first Gulf Coast Wooden Boat Show using barges that were in the area for casino development and moored them at the Biloxi Yacht Club. Today, the show carries the name of one of our past board presidents and an avid supporter of tourism and the museum, the Billy Creel Memorial Gulf Coast Wooden Boat Show.
An 8,000-square-foot museum expansion and refurbishing, along with a pier and pavilion for the schooners were the next improvements.
Then came Hurricane Katrina, destroying the Museum and damaging the almost-complete schooner pier, but the two schooners survived upriver.
The next five or six years were a living hell! I felt as though I was fighting every day to bring the museum back. I was offered a position in banking, but decided my fate was not to abandon the museum.
We obtained FEMA trailers, rebuilt and opened the Schooner Pier in 2006, opened a temporary museum at Edgewater Mall in 2010 and never missed a summer of Sea-n-Sail Adventure Camp for the children.
In February 2001, the momentous groundbreaking for the new museum took place. We were climbing back up the hill again, out of that dark pit. In August 2014, we celebrated three magnificent days of grand opening events. The assistance of many, many people in the community, board and advisory members, employees and volunteers have made this institution and brought back our beloved Maritime and Seafood Industry Museum. I would like to thank each and every one of them.
242 SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living • September 2018
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