Leaving the Computer Behind
by Elias Isquith

To say that Jessica DuLong’s last eight years have been unusual is an understatement. Working as a dot-com executive in 2001, DuLong was to discover that her calling was not to be found in her Empire State Building office, but rather in the river that is so close (and yet so far) to most New Yorkers: the Hudson. Her course was set after she took up her boss’s offer of a complimentary day of work on his fireboat, the formerly FDNY-owned John J. Harvey. Named after the captain of one of the department’s earlier fireboats (who, incidentally, perished in a fire), the Harvey was now retired, but nevertheless kept afloat by the largesse of a few enthusiasts who appreciated her stubborn insistence to keep on chugging. Sweating under the heat and pressure of the ship’s engine room, would, as DuLong told me, send her from “working at a dot-com, building websites you can’t even hold in your hands, to being an engineer.” Along the way, she earned her engineering and Coast Guard licenses, had a crash-course on the history of the Hudson—and wrote a book, her first, My River Chronicles.

At its heart, the story of My River Chronicles is as much about the Hudson—and the nation it helped build—as it is a memoir. DuLong was, in her own words, “having this discovery process that involved a story that was four centuries old.” It’s a good story, too—in many ways, the history of the Hudson is not unlike that of the whole United States. There’s the pioneering spirit of those who first made it their home, the economic-glory years of industry, manufacturing, and dependable work on its banks, and there’s the region’s awkward transition into the nation’s new service economy. “The 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s voyage is a great moment to take stock of where we’ve been,” says DuLong, who suggests to me, and in the book, that America must look to its past, its history of hard work and production—of making things—in order to find answers to the questions we confront today amidst economic uncertainty. “In order to have success [as a country],” says DuLong, “we have to make what we need—so much of what we need is made by somebody else.”

But DuLong doesn’t set out to write a political treatise in My River Chronicles, and although her argument is compelling, the book focuses equally on the changes within DuLong that occurred following her new vocation. Leaving her job in the city for her new life on the water, DuLong soon found that her work on the John J. Harvey awakened a side of herself that had gone dormant while she toiled behind PC screens. Working in the ship’s engine, tending to its myriad components like delicate, feeling members of a great whole, reminded DuLong of her father’s career as a mechanic and the values of unadorned, purposeful work he embodied. Although her “white-collar” side, as she calls it, could never fully fade away, her work aboard the John J. Harvey on the Hudson (and other ships elsewhere) profoundly reconnected her with her blue-collar roots.

Such a reawakening—a return to our simple, sans-screen beginnings of making what we need—is not unlike what she recommends for her country today. But, economic policy aside, DuLong equally hopes to share her experiences these past eight years with others. “I realize[d] I had a vehicle for sharing stories that wouldn’t find their way outside the community,” she told me, “to me, that really was key.”

Perhaps most importantly, My River Chronicles, like the many parts of the John J. Harvey itself, is something you can hold in your hand. No screens required.