During Richard Henry Dana, Jr.'s voyages, he had kept a diary, and in 1840 he published a memoir, Two Years Before the Mast. With the California Gold Rush later in the decade, Two Years Before the Mast would become highly sought after as one of the few sources of information on California. Tracing an awe-inspiring oceanic route from Boston, around Cape Horn, to the California coast, Two Years Before the Mast is both a riveting story of adventure and the most eloquent, insightful account we have of life at sea in the early nineteenth century.

Come visit the Dana Point Nature Interpretive Center for the Dana Point Historical Society's reading of Richard Henry Dana, Jr.'s Two Years Before the Mast.

For more information, contact the Dana Point Historical Society at 949-248-8121 or email DPHistorical@HotMail.com.