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AÇOREANA, Suplemento 6, Setembro 2009: 9-13
THE AZORES WORKSHOPS
António M. de Frias Martins
Sociedade Afonso Chaves, 9501-903 Ponta Delgada, São Miguel, Açores, Portugal
e-mail: afonsochaves.sac@gmail.com
Twenty-one years ago, as a joint initiative
of Sociedade Afonso Chaves and
the Department of Biology of the
University of the Azores, and under the
sponsorship of the local Municipality,
about half a dozen foreign scientists gathered
in Vila Franca do Campo and, setting
up an improvised laboratory in the dark
and humid facilities of the local newspaper
“A Crença”, made history with the
realization of the 1 st International
Workshop of Malacology. The workshop
participants came from the most prestigious
scientific institutions: the
Universities of Hong Kong, Harvard,
Rhode Island, Liverpool, from the
Smithsonian Institution, the Muséum
national d’Histoire naturelle, Paris and
the California Academy of Sciences. With
another half dozen local scientists and
academics, and aspiring young students,
science was made right there, next to one
of Vila Franca’s most significant monuments
to culture and education of: the
“Externato”. So worried with the (primitive)
logistics were the organizers that
they did not think of registering the event
photographically for posterity.
Nevertheless, in 1990 the proceedings of
this first workshop came to light and
remain today a reference document for
the scientific study of the Ilhéu de Vila
Franca do Campo and of the malacological
fauna of the Azorean littoral.
The research workshops, as regular
events, were popularized in the scientific
community by Brian Morton when
Professor of Marine Ecology at the
University of Hong Kong and Director of
the Swire Institute of Marine Science.
Through them, every three years, Brian
rendered available for invited specialists
in various scientific fields two weeks of
research, with but one requisite in return:
to publish in the proceedings of the event
at least one research paper on the marine
biology of Hong Kong. Brian Morton had
visited the Azores in 1965, as a Chelsea
College graduate, and since then has
developed a special appreciation for these
islands. It was then that I had the opportunity
of meeting him and, from that time
on, a relationship based on friendship
and mutual respect developed that time
has only made stronger.
The 2 nd workshop, in 1991, and this
time in the facilities of the fish market in
Vila Franca do Campo, attracted about 40
participants, national and foreign, with
the corresponding scientific production
broadened to other endeavours of marine
biology besides malacology. The spectrum
of participants was equally widened
to include Australia and Hong Kong, various
American institutions (University of
Rhode Island, Smithsonian Institution,