B+H Shipping Group Supports URI Fisheries Research Vessel
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Profile in Giving
Photo(s) by Michael Salerno
Neither Michael Hudner nor his wife, Hope, have a direct connection to the University of Rhode Island. So, why did they arrange for Michael’s company, B+H Fishing Group, to contribute $100,000 to endow operation of a new fisheries research vessel at URI?
The Hudners, avid sailors for years, have made their livelihood in marine trades, specifically international tanker transportation. For that reason and others, they have felt incumbent to help find solutions to marine related problems, including potential catastrophes resulting from oil spills.
Michael, a Harvard graduate who has co-owned and chaired B+H since 1978, sees URI as an important link in a regional research and environmental protection chain that stretches from Mystic and Storrs, Conn., to Cambridge and Woods Hole, Mass. “URI’s College of the Environment and Life Sciences sits in the middle of the world’s foremost concentration of ocean science,” he says. “We’ve contributed before to programs at the University of Massachusetts/Dartmouth, and it made sense to us to make this grant to URI. We’re interested in all aspects of marine environmental protection, including fisheries, and they’re doing critical fisheries research at URI.”
The endowment from B+H, which manages 10 tankers worldwide ranging in size from 40,000 to 100,000 tons, will underwrite operation, maintenance, and upgrades of URI’s new boat, named for Hope Hudner and dedicated on May 4, 2004. The 35-foot vessel carries up to 14 crew members and vastly improves the response speed available to researchers in the Department of Fisheries, Animal, and Veterinary Science. According to Dennis Nixon, associate dean of the College of the Environment and Life Sciences, the boat’s 24-knot capacity means researchers can get to trouble or crisis spots faster.
Hudner explained that the gift synchronizes with B+H’s previous support of marine science programs and of “civil discourse on the issues involving shipping and the marine environment.” As it turned out, Hudner appeared on a panel with Nixon at a forum exploring oil spills, which inspired Nixon to approach Hudner for support of URI’s fisheries research.
“Hope and I lived in New York for many years but were drawn back to this region 10 years ago,” says Hudner, who grew up in Swansea, Mass. “We are keen sailors and have always enjoyed the quality of life in Rhode Island and southern New England. The company’s gift to the College of the Environment and Life Sciences will contribute to the quality of life around the state and the Bay for all of us. It will also assist the local fishing industry and fishermen, which we think is important for its own sake both as a source of employment and as a significant contributor to the quality and character of life in Rhode Island.”
—John Pantalone
John Pantalone ’71 is a lecturer in the URI Journalism Department.
