MV Brown Bear was an American research vessel in commission in the fleet of the United States Department of Agriculture′s Bureau of Biological Survey and Alaska Game Commission from 1934 to 1940 and in the fleet of the United States Department of the Interior′s Fish and Wildlife Service from 1940 to 1942 and from 1946 to 1951, under the control of the University of Washington from 1952 to 1965, and in commission in the fleet of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service from 1965 to 1970 and of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration′s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) from 1970 to 1972.

After her NMFS service, the ship operated commercially as the dive tender MV Baja Explorador before returning to her original name.

[1][2] The Seattle, Washington, naval architect Harold Cornelius Hanson designed her specifically for biological research work.

[1] The Winslow Marine Railway and Shipbuilding Company built Brown Bear[1][2] at Bainbridge Island, Washington.

[1] In 1939, Brown Bear transported Bureau ichthyologist and University of Michigan Curator of Fishes Dr. Carl L. Hubbs to Unalaska and the Pribilof Islands during an intensive study he made of the Territory of Alaska's fisheries and marine mammals, and in September 1939 the ship conveyed him to Seattle.

[1] The Navy designated her as a yard patrol vessel, renamed her USS YP-197, and transferred her to the United States Coast Guard on 5 January 1942.

[1] Brown Bear left Seattle on 3 April 1947 carrying FWS personnel to Southeast Alaska, where they worked the downstream pink salmon fry-counting weir at the FWS Little Port Walter field station at Port Walter, Territory of Alaska.

[1] The U.S. Navy again requisitioned Brown Bear when she arrived at Juneau in 1951,[1] but by the summer of 1952 the University of Washington's Department of Oceanography had acquired her.

[1] The university employed her in research projects in Alaska, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon, and in parts of the Columbia River, and she often operated in cooperation with vessels from other agencies.

[1] Between January and August 1965, Brown Bear made four cruises off the coasts of Washington and Oregon during which she collected physical, biological, and chemical data regarding the properties of Columbia River effluent water.

On 3 October 1970, a major reorganization occurred which formed the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under the United States Department of Commerce.

[1] She eventually was refloated, and sometime in late 1997 or January 1998 she was towed out to sea and scuttled in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego.