BOOKS Such errors do not ruin a book, but they do shake the reader's confidence in the care taken by the author in JOHN HASKELL KEMBLE writing it. Dr. Kemble, retired professor of history at Pomona College, California, is author of numerous books and studies on Pacific maritime history and has pioneered or inspired much of the best work we have in this field today.
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Jeffrey Simpson: The Hudson River, 1850-1918: a Photographic Portrait, by Jeffrey Simpson (Sleepy Hollow Press, Tarrytown, NY, 1981, 208 pp., 150 photos, $29.95) . The natural beauty of this flooded Atlantic inlet haunts these pages, in a beautiful book which shows that the camera can catch the sublimities sought after by the painters of the Hudson River School. And what an era these tumultuous decades cover! And what actors, on such a stage! We have the warm, stubborn humanity of the Roosevelts, the frigid rectitude of Vanderbilts, extravagances of Goulds and crazy-quilt eclectic cosiness of Washington Irving ... and the dazed, still confident hope shining in the eyes of immigrants newly debarked in the great city thatgrewupattheriver'sseawardend. We catch in this work a strong sense of timeless Hudson neighborhoods, and the vitality and fantastic change of the great cities, which as the author observes have a modern quality of nervous energy even in those more spacious, to us now vanished halcyon days . Vision, meticulous accuracy in historic fact, and a sense of time's sweep and flow inform the pages of this work, a visual delight and refreshment for the soul. I commend it to those who know and love the Hudson, and those who would like to understand the mightly role of the Hudson in our history and its powerful hold on men's minds. Sleepy Hollow Restorations, publishers of this book, are also custodians of that proud, eventful heritage in their three restored manors along the lower river. They have become an important regional resource and publishing authority. The Hudson River gives us new reason to be glad they do these things, and do them so well. PS Davis Boats, by Marty Loken (Center for Wooden Boats, 2770 Westlake Ave . North, Seattle WA 98109, 1981, 27 pp., $4.50 postpaid). The significance of this booklet lies in its treatment of a type of small craft important to regional history. Far too often the small work boats used by watermen and
fishermen have been ignored by maritime historians and writers. This work is an excellent example of what can be accomplished by diligent amateur research. There is nothing amateur however, about the booklet itself, which is not surprising since the author, Marty Loken, was managing editor of Alaska magazine for a number of years. The text centers around the small craft built by three generations of the Davis family in southeast Alaska. John Davis Sr. , a Tsimshian indian, was born in 1850 near Prince Rupert, British Columbia. The natives of that region were skilled builders of highly developed dugout canoes, but young John was impressed by the planked boats carried aboard visiting Hudson's Ba y Company trading schooners. He carved models of these gigs and shore boats and determined that one day he would build such craft. As he grew up he became a competent carpenter and blacksmith, eventually moving to Vancouver where he built flat-bottom skiffs. Carpenters were in demand as a result of the Seattle fire of 1889 and so John worked in that city for a time. When gold was discovered in the Yukon in 1898 John and his son Roderick joined the stampede, but instead of prospecting they mined the pockets of the miners by building flat-bottom boats and small barges on Lake Bennett. These crude craft were used for one-way trips down the Yukon River to the gold fields, carrying the prospectors and their provisions. There is included a fascinating photo of the camp at Lake Bennett, showing at least 23 boats, of great variety, under construction around a portable sawmill. After three summers of this the two Davis men returned to Seattle with enough gold to realize John' s dream of building boats. John then took his family to the Tsimshian village of Metlakatla in southeast Alaska and built a home, sawmill, boatyard, marine ways, fish saltery, general store and logging operation. The first boats turned out by Davis and Son, Boatbuilders, were flat-bottom skiffs used by the local watermen . Two men could turn out two 12-18' boats per day. Of course local woods, logged and sawn by their own mill were used. Some time before 1905 they built their first round-bottom craft, a sealing boat for the Sitka fishery. These led to the design by John of a smaller double-ender, 13' to 16' in length, which fishermen could row easier than the flat-iron skiffs, and which was considered more seaworthy. With leg of mutton rigs these boats could be sailed as well as rowed, and were used extensively in the hand-troll fishery for halibut and SEA HISTORY, WINTER 1982