Editing Ed Ricketts (section)

==Lab==
{{main|Pacific Biological Laboratories}}
[[File:Pacific Biological Laboratories.JPG|thumb|Ricketts' lab at [[Cannery Row|800 Cannery Row]]]]
In 1923, Ed Ricketts and his business partner Albert Galigher started Pacific Biological Laboratories (PBL), a marine biology supply house. The lab was located in Pacific Grove at 165 Fountain Avenue.<ref>{{cite book
  | last =Seavey
  | first =Kent
  | title =Pacific Grove
  | publisher =Arcadia Publishing
  | year =2005
  | isbn =978-0-7385-2964-6
  | page =110 }}</ref><!--and operated until 1928. needs source--> The business was moved to 740 Ocean View Avenue, Monterey, California, with Ricketts as sole owner. Today, this location is [[Cannery Row|800 Cannery Row]].

On November 25, 1936, a fire broke out at the Del Mar Cannery next to the lab. Most of the laboratory's contents were destroyed. The typescript of ''Between Pacific Tides'' survived, as it had already been sent to Stanford University for publication. With an investment from John Steinbeck, who became silent partner and 50% owner of the business as a result, Ricketts rebuilt the lab using the original floorplan.

Ricketts' lab on Cannery Row had attracted visitors who ran the gamut from writers, artists and musicians to prostitutes and bums. Gatherings often included discussions of philosophy, science and art, and sometimes developed into parties that continued for days.<ref name="Bruce Robison 2004, p. 1"/> Participants in meetings had included Steinbeck, [[Bruce Ariss]], [[Joseph Campbell#The Great Depression|Joseph Campbell]] (who had worked at the lab as Ricketts' assistant), [[Adelle Davis]],<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.online.pacifica.edu/cgl/Campbellchronology |title=Joseph Campbell - Chronology |access-date=March 31, 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081227072637/http://www.online.pacifica.edu/cgl/Campbellchronology |archive-date=December 27, 2008 }} Campbell Chronology Accessed March 30, 2009</ref> [[Henry Miller]], [[Lincoln Steffens]] and [[Francis Whitaker]]. Amid the tumult of commercial activity and tourist attractions that Cannery Row has become in recent decades, the modest and mostly unnoticed and unmarked lab stands as a silent witness to the bygone era celebrated in Steinbeck's work.

Ricketts' laboratory business was fictionalized in Steinbeck's ''Cannery Row'' as "Western Biological Laboratories."<ref>{{cite book
  | last1 = McElrath | first1 = Joseph R.
  | last2 = Crisler | first2 = Jesse S.
  | last3 = Shillinglaw | first3 = Susan
  | title =Pacific Grove
  | publisher =Cambridge University
  | year =1996
  | isbn =978-0-521-41038-0
  | page =372 }}</ref>

Steinbeck was inspired to write ''[[The Pearl (novel)|The Pearl]]'' after visiting La Paz, Baja California Sur with Ricketts on their Sea of Cortez expedition.