Edward "Ted" Griffin is an American former aquarium owner and entrepreneur who was the first man to ever swim with a killer whale in a public exhibition. He is best known for capturing, performing with, and selling a number of orcas during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Orcas
In June 1965, salmon fisherman William Lechkobit had set up a fishing net in the offing of the small cannery town of Namu, British Columbia. An anchor snapped off, causing the net to drift to another bay, where it trapped an orca. When he went to reclaim his missing net, Lechkobit was surprised to discover the captive animal, as orcas do not typically jump over nets. Lechkobit returned to port and decided to sell what he had inadvertently trapped. Lechkobit called Vancouver Aquarium to make a deal and stipulated a payment of $10,000 in cash. The aquarium could not comply as all of the banks were closed. The Seattle Marine Aquarium was then contacted and Ted Griffin purchased the orca for $8,000. Reguald "Curly" Marinas designed a cage to tow the orca, named Namu, in a floating pen to captivity in Seattle.
Seattle Marine Aqauarium
Griffin owned the Seattle Marine Aquarium on the Elliott Bay waterfront in Seattle, which opened in 1962 and was originally known as the Seattle Public Aquarium. Namu was only the third orca ever captured and was the first to perform and swim with a person for audiences. Namu survived just over one year in captivity and died in his pen on July 9, 1966. Griffin also captured the original Shamu in 1965 and leased her to SeaWorld in San Diego. Altogether, Griffin and his partner Don Goldsberry captured and sold about 30 orcas in and around Puget Sound between 1965 and 1972. They charged buyers $20,000 to $25,000 per captured orca. Their largest capture took place in August 1970, when they netted most of all three pods of the Southern Resident orca population. When activists attempted to cut the nets, four animals drowned, included three calves. Griffin and Goldsberry attempted to conceal the deaths by weighting and sinking the bodies, but months later the carcasses washed up. This operation also resulted in the capture of the orca Lolita, who is currently kept in Miami and has been subject of petitions and legal actions to retire her to more natural life conditions.
In May 1972, in response to rising regulation, Griffin retired from orca capture and sold his portion of the Seattle Marine Aquarium to Goldsberry, who soon after sold it to SeaWorld. In 1982 Griffin published Namu, Quest for the Killer Whale, an account of his time with Namu and the transformation of public views of killer whales.
