Ocean Station Papa, at 50¿N, 145¿W in the Alaska Gyre (Figure 1), started as a weather station in the 1940s. In 1956, oceanographers began collecting a suite of standard measurements from the cool subarctic waters at Ocean Station Papa (OSP), including temperature, salinity, oxygen, and plankton. Three years later, a series of sampling stations was added along the 1400-kilometer 'Line P' from the Canadian coast to OSP, to aid in understanding ocean variability.