At left, the bones of the St. Mary. The hulk split apart in a gale in 1970, and her wreckage is strewn across nearby beaches. Above, the lower masts of the St. Mary. Charles Cooper-She was built as a is as important to the history of the St. Mary-A representative of the final era in our building of wooden square- packet ship for the North Atlantic im- United States as the Vasa is to Sweden, rigged merchant vessels, was launched migrant trade in 1856. Packets were the and as unique. The miracle of the Cooper is that she at Phippsburg, Maine in 1890 for the first ocean-going vessels to sail on a trade between New York and San Fran- fixed schedule, and the success of this has survived at all: it is not that she is cisco. On her maiden voyage she col- experiment was a major milestone in the in good condition, but that she is in as lided with another ship near the Falk- development of New York as our most good condition as she is. The Cooper is lands and ran ashore while trying to important seaport. The Cooper was buil t in short, no longer a ship able to deal reach Port Stanley. The wreck has at Black' Rock, Connecticut and origi- with the sea, and she should not be conbroken up over the years, but most of nally owned in New York. Later in her sidered a ship but a large and beautiful one side survives, with portions of the career she was employed in world-wide structure of singular historical value. decks. The American square-riggers trading. She was condemned at Port She is the most complicated piece of which followed the clipper ships are Stanley in 1866 and converted to a float- American 19th Century craftsmanship commonly termed : :downeasters" since ing storage hulk. Later grounded to in wood that exists today-and probably most were built in Maine. St. Mary is serve as a warehouse, she was still in the most beautiful. The tweendecks are the miracle of the today the largest surviving remnant of a use in 1970. She has been roofed over and is consequently very well preserved Cooper. Here, slightly obstructed by the downeaster. The last major deterioration of the internally. A portion of the original remnants of the clay sewer pipes stored wreck occurred during the great gale of carved decoration from both the bow in her by the Falkland Islands Company, 1970, which drove the remaining part and the stern survives. Like the Snow is a sight never before seen in living of the hull high onto the beach and split Squall, she is the only remaining ship of memory for the bulkheads built midit in two, lengthwise. One hundred and her type. She is also the most intact ships when she was hulked. Here then is seventy feet of the starboard side of the American-built square-rigged merchant the elegant eye of the Yankee craftsman, laying out traditional shapes in a tradihull remains on the beach, lying flat on vessel in existence. The Snow Squall and the St. Mary tional way. The beauty of the shapes its side. The remains of the St. Mary have sur- are finite projects. That is, they are created by the broad-axe and the adze, vived because they lie in a remote part archeology-museum projects, rather spile and batten and a dozen kinds of of the Islands, normally accessible only than projects requiring the development planes pulls at the heart of the onlooker after one or two days' travel in a Land of new concepts and new engineering whereever it is seen: it is only visible Rover or on horseback. Recovery of sig- techniques. The Charles Cooper pre- today in this country in the tweendecks nificant parts of the ship is feasible at sents a problem that has never arisen of the Constitution and the Charles Morgan. But this ship was built for paslittle expense, with equipment presently before, because she is an intact ship. The only comparable dilemma that sengers, and these tweendecks were available in the Falkland Islands and without the logistical problems asso- has been successfully resolved is that of made to be seen and lived in. Unlike the Vasa. We propose that the Cooper others, where the nostalgic memory is ciated with diving.
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