Sister Sailors is an epistolary play inspired by letters from women who sailed on whaling ships with their Sea Captain husbands in the late 1800s. The play focuses on the exchange of letters between two sisters, Essie, who joins her husband on a whaling ship, and Catherine, who stays home to care for their parents and the family store. Sister Sailors interweaves first-person accounts from letters and journals of that period with historical photographs and the music of sea chanties.