The orca and the orca catcher

He saw the orca looming, so close, in the sea pen hastily welded together for the more-than 400-mile tow to Seattle.

“I dive down and oh God, there is this shadow four feet away, looking at me,” said Ted Griffin, remembering his first moments with Namu, soon to become the world’s first performing captive killer whale.

Then he heard it: A loud SQUEAK.

“I think it is the whale, so I go ‘EEEE’ and within half a second, the whale squeaks,” Griffin said, eyes still wide with the memory. “My God, I am crying, I can barely keep my mask on. It is indescribable. What has happened is that all those years I am wanting an animal to say hello, and one has. I am thunderstruck.”

Word of Namu — named for the remote B.C. village where he was accidentally caught in a fishermen’s net — quickly spread. Thousands of onlookers backed up for miles on and near Deception Pass Bridge hoping to catch a glimpse when Namu’s Navy, as the orca’s entourage of onlookers, press and promoters was called, passed beneath.

Arriving in Seattle on July 28, 1965, Griffin was given a hero’s welcome and a key to the city.