Shavings Volume 8 Number 6 (November-December 1986)

®1986 The Center for Wooden Boats — Volume 8, Number 6 — Nov.-Dec. 1986 — 25¢

THE STATE OF THE CENTER When I considered the Center's long-term goals, I'm amazed that we even had the chutzpah to begin. But when I walk out on the floats and survey the C W B as it exists today I'm more amazed by what a group of volunteers has been able to create in three and a half years. Since we've moved to our Waterway Four site the umbrella of our long-winded name has sheltered the beginning of four major developments: • The west coast's only small craft museum, • A public rental fleet of good wood boats, • A school teaching time-tested, traditional boatbuilding skills, and • A park from an unused and abused piece of public property.

Before the C W B came, the last major development at the southern end of Lake Union was the Naval Reserve Center...50 years ago.

We have changed our neighborhood far beyond the trees we have planted, the Boatshop, Pavilion, and floats we have built, and our fleet of traditional boats. These material additions are only the focus around which constant motion occurs—friendly, festive, social, educational activities. In effect, we have brought people back to an urban desert.

Our boat collection has greatly expanded in 1986. Fifteen vessels have been added to the display fleet. Over 60 boats are on public view.

Ten sailboats and over 20 rowboats are ready for use. At this moment, four sailboats and four rowboats, all distinct historic types, are being prepared as additions to our working fleet.

Progress on the upland site in 1986 has been a paved parking lot, a detailed landscape plan, about ten trees, and the start of lakeside landscaping. The grass and more plants are pledged. Yet needed are excavation, grading, topsoil, trees, gateway, outlook deck, and even more paving—a $20,000 budget.

Most of the boat maintenance and rental operation has been done by volunteers.

Assistance has been donated every day. Over 50 faithful and skilled volunteers have contributed close to 4,000 hours. These good people are C W B ' s most precious resource.

C W B ' s workshops in our Victorian boatshop have ranged from basic woodworking to building a traditional lapstrake boat. This year about 200 students will have taken courses. Five boats will have been built by students.

The bimonthly issues of Shavings are another proud accomplishment. The newsletter receives compliments from members and educational organizations. A n d though our membership is mainly in the Pacific Northwest, we have loyal subscribers in Japan, Australia, New Caledonia, Norway, Sweden, and The Netherlands.

This year we received the floating foundation for our Education Center as a donation from Hurlen Marine Construction. This building will be our auditorium, exhibit space, museum store, library, and administration office. We received a challenge grant to complete this building. For every $2.00 we raise, the Oakmead Foundation will contribute $1.00. The budget is $100,000.

Therefore, we need to raise $65,000 to match Oakmead's generous offer, and complete our last major structure.

We have achieved m u c h in a short time through donations of cash, labor, creative revenue earnings, and canny budgeting. With the continued warm, generous, and trusting support of members and friends, and a continuing supply of chutzpah, pur vision will be fulfilled. — Dick Wagner •

Over 30,000 thronged to our Tenth Annual Wooden Boat Festival, one of Seattle's most popular freebies. About 15,000 more came to C W B this year to participate in our two regattas, look at our boats, munch a picnic lunch in our Pavilion, feed the ducks, marvel at a purple sunset, or rub against our Boatshop stove on a cold day with a steaming cup of coffee.

O u r boats are rented 12 months a year. This year, at least 6,000 people took an outing in one of the classic craft. A r o u n d 500 came to our monthly talks and films. School field trips brought close to 500 children to the Center where they rowed boats, did plank-on-frame work in the shop, practiced knot tying, and took home a dory kit.

SING H E Y F O R T H E J O L L Y B A R G E M A N : 200 Y E A R S OF HISTORY AND SEVENTY MILES O N T H E BRITISH CANALS Story and photos by Chas. D o w d The Center for Wooden Boats is devoted to the workboats that raft up along the edges of maritime photos. While everyone else oohs and ahs over the schooners in Gloucester harbor, our attention is on the solitary doryman over near the corner of the picture, rowing home after tending his lobster pots. Others discourse about the tea clippers booming into San Francisco, our interest is in the Whitehall boats that deliver crimps and chandler's water-clerks to them outside the Golden Gate. O u r fleet of small boats bobs in the evening shadow of the Wawona. An ad for "hotel narrow boats" in the classifieds of Atlantic gave us a chance to experience another unsung breed of working craft, the narrow boats of England's

canals.

C a n a l boats kept England's Industrial Revolution moving. In the early 1700's, during industrialism's first stirrings, the kingdom's highways were little more than prehistoric tracks following trade routes based on cattle driving and

the distribution of stone axes. G o o d s moved by wagon in summer, by pack train in the autumn and spring, and not at all in winter. The canals changed that, providing dependable all-weather transportation. Since canal boating was laborcontinued on page 4

T H E CITY HAS DISCOVERED L A K E UNION While we were planning the completion of our small craft museum and park, an opportunity for an even larger maritime preservation waterfront park has come hull-up on the horizon. O u r Mayor and C i t y Council have recently declared a South Lake Union metamorphosis. The C i t y has just purchased the Evergreen Florist warehouse next to C W B , a major investment by Seattle in the future park. A request for proposals for a park design consultant has been published. O u r m o r n i n g paper lists S o u t h L a k e U n i o n redevelopment as one of the City's "must d o " agenda items. The question is, will we get a beige butterfly, or one that is vibrant and multicolored?

acquired, and the C W B park and pavilion on Waterway 4.

T H E TRAFFIC JUST

ISN'T

THAT BAD

H o w will people get to this bustling neighborhood? The dreaded Mercer Corridor is not yet in its death throes. 30,000 people visit us during our three-day Wooden Boat Festival and no one has complained that they were stuck in a gridlock, or couldn't park within easy walking.

Our new neighbor, Benjamin's, is so popular that their customers are wall-to-wall every Friday at 6 pm, the height of rush hour traffic. Part of its popularity is because it is so easy to find and easy to park. The Seattle Times, our neighbor up the

street, needs easy freeway ingress and egress because they require tons of newsprint to come in and tons of newspapers to leave. They are buying property around their plant for more warehouse space because the traffic flow is so convenient.

Of course, we admit there is congestion in the Mercer Corridor. This city has a long record of auto worship. We will never again be able to bop downtown in a car during working hours without some sort of slowdown, but we think the "Mercer M e s s " myth is over rated.

Here's a chance for a park like no other—a place for history buffs, craftspeople, people watchers, and those who simply love a good old boat. It will be a place of pleasant confusion, casual, unpretentious, fresh as the north breeze off Lake Union. ¢

O u r pioneer effort in clearing a public access to South Lake Union and providing recreational and educational activities makes us some kind of expert on traffic, parking, who comes here for recreation and information, why, and where they come from. With these credentials, here is our vision of the South Lake Union Park: Only a few of our historic vessels are still afloat. This park is our last chance to give them permanent moorage and public access. We have rallied to save the Public Market, Pioneer Square, and our old and colorful houseboats. N o w is the time to also build a Heritage Harbor for the 1897 schooner WAWONA, the 1889 tug ARTHUR FOSS, the 1902 steam lightship RELIEF, the 1922 steam excursion vessel V I R G I N I A V, and the 1913 sail training schooner ADVENTURESS. THE

HERITAGE

HARBOR

This harbor will be an active place, of course.

Our little craft will be available for use. Some of the larger vessels will be taking passengers on steamboat excursions, offering tall ship training, or rides on a classic Puget Sound tug. It will finally provide proper moorage for visiting classic vessels.

These craft will require constant upkeep, so ship and boat maintenance will be an essential part of the park's displays. This industrial use of the park is not heresy, it is historic continuity. The park site was never a rose garden. It has been used as a coal landing, saw mill, asphalt plant, houseboat wrecking yard, and street debris dump. By maintaining the boats where they moor, the public can watch the rebirth of historic vessels and historic skills, on a historic site.

C W B ' s skills preservation workshops will continue to thrive, with students coming from near and distant places. (Our current workshop has students from New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, California, and Canada.) There will be a bed and breakfast for the out-of-town students and instructors, possibly in one of the display vessels.

A maritime park on this scale will be humming night and day with activities. Besides our annual Wooden Boat Festival, an event that has become a Seattle fixture after ten years, we can see an annual maritime antique show, Indian canoe races, rallies for steamboats, classic runabouts, dories, canoes, catboats, and Poulsbo boats. We expect a boat designers' weekend, a yearly maritime heritage lecture, sea chantey concerts, a tugboat rendezvous, maritime film festival, Victorian boating parties, and an annual concert of Handel's Water Music.

For those who simply want a quiet spot of grass to contemplate life or romp with the kids, there will be a green oasis at the west side of Waterway 3, which the Parks Department has recently

DESIGNER'S N O T E B O O K A RIG F O R T H E R O M A N T I C I N A L L O F U S

by Paul Gartside, N.A. I have in my past a couple of G R P designs based on working boat lines. They still tick away in a modest fashion, bringing the occasional royalty and also a seemingly endless string of enquiries for bigger or smaller versions. Simpler and cheaper are also popular requests— especially cheaper.

There is something about a gaff rigged cutter which excites the romantics of the world. The enquiry/commission ratio in this department is something I don't like to think about, particularly as so far I've found no foolproof way to sort the wheat from the chaff at the point where it would

be most useful.

This latest addition to the cutter line was drawn as a proposal for an Irishman about 12 months ago, then picked up and commissioned last month by a customer in South Africa. I think he's got a good one—it is certainly one of the better hulls I've drawn of this model—and it's a nice size.

There is comfortable accommodation for two with extra berth space available if needed. The design displacement is 8 tons, which makes her heavy by today's standards. Provided we can set plenty of light sail area I don't feel that is a great handicap and it does make it easier to carry cruising stores. As drawn there will be several hundred pounds of inside ballast. This will be tossed ashore when we load for the South Seas.

Construction is conventional carvel on bent frames with lots of big lumps of wood and bolts in the centerline. To make life easier, I've doubled the frames to finish l / " square, which means we 3

4

SANTA COMES BUT O N C E A YEAR AND SOMETIMES THAT'S T O O M U C H

by C h a s . D o w d Every year just about this time, Aunt Finella and Uncle Oscar haul out their one difference of opinion. It is the only grain of sand in the oyster of their marriage and they keep it polished and pearly. Aunt Finella firmly contends that the three oriental personages who brought gifts to Bethlehem are called "The Three Wise M e n " .

Uncle Oscar refers to them as "The Three Kings". He insists that nobody but a king or some other politician with no idea of the value of money would have initiated the custom of Christmas presents.

When a wife looks at a boating husband and says, " W h a t would you like for Christmas, dear?" she hopes to hear something like a new set of charts, two new fenders, or one of those nifty little gimballed holders for a highball glass. He yearns to suggest a 95-foot bluenose schooner. But he knows he's going to get the fenders.

Captain M'Naughten's wife has an easier time of it than some. Hilda and the Captain live aboard a large, damp ketch. The Captain holds that the reading of books is a pernicious habit, leading to early nearsightedness and bad posture—barring three exceptions: M o b y Dick, The American Practical Navigator, and Huckleberry Finn. " M e t a p h y s i c s , maritime essentials, and mankind," he claims waving whichever of these three volumes is in best repair, "it's all here." So Hilda buys him one of the three on a regular schedule each Christmas. By the time the third Christmas rolls around, mold, mildew, and the ship's cat have reduced the volume to pulp and she replaces it. If one of the volumes is particularly well bound and hangs together more than three years, Hilda just buys the Captain some more rope. " Y o u can always use more rope," he growls.

"There's no such thing as enough rope.

Politicians should be given more rope for sure, considering the number of them as yet unhung."

With an eighteen foot open boat, Stroke O a r and I have decided that we're getting no additional gear. We may refine or improve what we have, but there is a limit to what we can reasonably carry. Goliath (not his real name) X (not his real initial) forgot about the limitations of small boats

when he introduced his wife Desdemona (not her real name, either) to boat camping. Desdemona had never been out in the wilds before. She once remarked that she would be happiest on a planet that was all indoors and candlelit.

When we went camping with Goliath and Desdemona, he packed a tent, two self-inflating air mattresses, a three-burner stove with fuel, a reflector oven for the campfire, a Coleman lantern, a candle lantern, a matched set of flashlights, folding chairs and a folding table, an ice chest, a clothesline, washing-up gear, food, and a set of china ramekins for Coquilles de St. Jaques in case they found some mussels. Two changes of clothes apiece and their raingear was added to the rest of this clabber in a Whitebear Skiff, leaving just enough room aft for Goliath and his oars. Desdemona travelled in a separate kayak. We're afraid to see what they might need on a three-day weekend.

Saddest of all gift stories is the tale of Weldon and his schooner. Weldon was a family man with a wife, two children, and a dog named Point Four.

He also had a trig little 20-foot convertible powerboat he fished from. Weldon loved little mottoes like "A Boat Is a Hole in the Water Filled With Money," and "Marriages Performed By the Captain of This Vessel Are Only Valid for the Length of the Voyage." His wife bought him one

every year and he happily affixed it to the boat.

Then, inexplicably, this sensible, prudent man developed a rampaging case of two-foot-itis. The convertible changed to a cruiser, then to a sloop, then to a sixty-foot Hand motorsailer.

It all ended when Weldon secretly cashed in his shares of the.company's stock option plan, took a second mortgage on his home, cleaned out the savings account, made the initial payment on a 95foot bluenose schooner, and sailed it into the sunset, beyond the reach of creditors, wife, family, and the respect of all right-thinking mankind. I got a letter from him explaining the circumstances of his flight. In the accompanying snapshot Weldon is standing in the bright sun on a white sand beach, too destitute to even possess shoes. His skin has turned a rich shade of brown which is too even to be healthy. He looks exhausted and is held upright by a group of young women, women so poverty-striken they are dressed only in leaves and flowers.

"It was the last motto," he says in the letter. "I put it right above the wheel: ' O h L o r d , Y o u r sea is so large and my boat is so small'. First it just made me cautious, then it made me scared, finally it made me mad. I decided that nobody was gonna tell me my boat was too damn small. So I got the biggest one I could find. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta d o . " •

CWB

OFFICERS

At the September meeting of our Board of trustees, the following officers were elected: President—Archie C o n n Secretary—Bob Bell Treasurer—Bill V a n V l a c k

C U L T U R E STRIKES ANACORTES

are only bending pieces 1-3/4" to 7/8". It is a little more work but easier on the nerves and much stronger than over-stressed single frames. Plank fastenings must be copper through fastenings, riveted, to pull everything together—screws won't do with this method.

There are a lot of hours in a boat of this size,

fortunately all of them pleasant. With winter approaching, an interesting project to chew away on in the evenings is a happy thought. If we optimistically estimate 5000 hours to launching, and two people, starting now and working steadily weekends and evenings, why we could have her in the water by J u l y — J u l y '88 that is •

C W B is considering sponsoring a bus tour to Anacortes for a performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore on Saturday, February 7, 1987. The excursion will include a bus from C W B on Saturday morning, a tour of some interesting Anacortes maritime hangouts, dinner, the performance, a party with the opera company, lodging, Sunday brunch, and bus back to Seattle. Please contact C W B if interested. 3822628.

continued from page 1 intensive and far-ranging, it bred a unique class of boatmen who housed their families in six-by-eight foot cabins, painted their boats like gypsywagons, and hung the tails of their favorite draft horses from their rudder posts as memorials.

LEARNING SOME BACKGROUND The best place to start learning about narrow boats is Ellesmere Port Boat M u s e u m . England is a country of world-class, four-star museums.

F r o m the lavish British M u s e u m to the one-room Fisherman's M u s e u m in Hastings, they all seem to understand how much we want to know and when enough is enough. In the category of special-interest museums, Ellesmere Port is tops.

Ellesmere Port was a major transshipment point where the Manchester Ship C a n a l , the Shropshire Union C a n a l , and Liverpool's port on the Mersey converge. W h e n the railroads and later the trains swallowed up most of the canalboat traffic, the Port fell into desuetude and dilapidation. Pounds silted in, buildings rusted and grass grew in the cracks of their brickwork and the brickwork of the locks.

Today, refurbished Stables tell the story of the horses who drew the first boats and lingered on as motive power into the Second W o r l d War. The P u m p House turns over two horizontal steam engines the first Sunday of each month and Bank Holidays. Enthusiasts are restoring two more.

fitted hoppers instead of loose in the hold, an early form of containerization. Alongside, a hydraulic crane held one of the hoppers over a barge, ready to load. T w o others were already aboard. There were tugs, icebreakers for winter, weedcutters for summer, and countless avatars of the barge.

Behind the Island Warehouse, by the mooring that held the barges while "porters"winched cargoes up and down through hatches in the warehouse floor overhead, we talked to a birdlike old shipwright in two down vests, taking a tea break. He said he'd just come back from Wales where he'd been hunting for crooks (he called it compass oak) to frame a wineglass transom.

Nowadays, he confided, it was hard to get such w o o d , at least wood that followed the tumblehome, the turn of the bilge and the reverse curve to the keel "unless you know where to go."

Especially if it had to be big enough for a barge with a fifteen-foot beam.

There are eleven major buildings open to visitors. There are six locks. The lawns, the brick warehouses, the waterways, and the black-andwhite lock gates form a striking setting for the fleet. Just beyond the M u s e u m , there's still a working port, and you can watch travel cranes sway truck boxes onto ocean-going freighters.

Y o u can picnic on sunny days. The cafeteria serves ale.

THE NARROW BOATS Wedged into a corner of the Upper Basin were the boats we had come to see, their harlequin paintwork bright against the brick warehouse.

These were the narrow boats, seven feet wide, seventy feet long. Slab-sided, they have a round stern, a blunt bow, and a flat sheer until three feet from the bow where it rises about six inches to meet the stemhead. This forward area has a steep one-plank tumblehome, too. Some are made of wood with iron frames, some are sided with iron.

Most have wood bottoms because they travelled so heavily laden they scraped along the shallower bits of canal. The cross-planked elm bottoms could be replaced when they wore thin. The wooden hulls are black and lumpy-looking, the result of treating them with a mixture of horsehair, horse manure, and tar, applied hot to prevent rot. The iron hulls are black and lumpy because the wooden ones are, an example of British conservatism.

Exhibits explain cargoes, the Manchester Ship C a n a l , the history of the inland waterways, how to paint traditional "Roses and Castles" narrow boat decorations, and how the bargemen, their wives, children, pets, and windowboxes lived.

Outside, a combination of volunteer effort and government employment programs have cleared the site, m u c k e d out the locks, trimmed the lawns, and restored the fleet. In the Lower Basin, the D o c k , and the Upper Basin, there's a 300-ton Weaver Packet, a Clyde Puffer, a Mersey Flat, and a Calder and Hebble West Country Barge named Ethel. We saw barges which carried coal in

The cabin of Gifford, a fully restored horsedrawn narrow boat, is open to visitors. Polished harness brasses and pierced-work plates made in the Five T o w n s hang from the fore bulkhead. To one side sits the stove where tea constantly brewed, as important to the running of the canals as the water that floated the boats. Crocheted doilies stretch like spiderwebs in the portholes.

Handpainted rose and castle decoration is throughout, framed by imitation wood-graining done by the same artist. It would be cozy accommodation for one, cramped for two, and claustrophobic for any more. The seating space is as large as a hall closet without the headroom; the single berth is coffin-sized. Yet the bargees grew up, lived, and died in those tiny spaces. There's even a "lazy a r m " in the Port, providing quiet moorage for bargemen's wives during childbirth.

On top of the cabin sits a brightly decorated two-gallon can that held the family's drinking and washing water. Whether they were traipsing along muddy towpaths, caring for their beloved horses, or working through ten to twelve locks a day, it was always a point of pride along " T h e C u t " to be spotlessly clean. When engines were installed on the boats, most bargemen painted the

The Poncysyllte Aqueduct takes The Cut across the River Dee engine spaces white and wore coveralls while they worked in them. Spotless white coveralls.

FROM WALES TO CHESHIRE AT THREE MILES AN H O U R Primed with this information, anticipation was high as we hiked up the hill from the Llangollen bus stop to experience The Cut for ourselves.

Awaiting us were the Mabie and the Forget-menot, a motor and an unpowered butty boat operated by Inland Waterway Holiday Cruises.

L t d . In their cargo carrying days, the two craft belonged to " N u m b e r O n e s " , independent owner-boatmen who were the top rank of canal society. Built in 1914 and 1928 respectively, they'd carried cheese and dairy products around the Cheshire Ring of canals, salt from workings that had been mined during the Roman occupation, and chocolate for Cadbury's. In tandem they represented 140 feet of accommodation for twelve passengers and four crew. Both had an open well-deck forward. The Mabel had a saloon for bad weather, and the shower. Forgef-me-nof had the dining room and the galley. We wondered at such a large crew, but serving wake-up coffee in bed, providing three delicious hot meals a day plus elevenses and tea kept two of them in the galley most of the time.

Right away we knew we'd chosen the right boats and the right cruise. The boats were the very last timber ones (British for wooden) still in charter. We would cross two aqueducts, navigate sixteen locks including the Grindley Brook Stair, pass through three tunnels, wind across seventy miles of rural countryside, and moor near a pub every night. As we were to discover, British beer and English ale were every bit as important as tea to the smooth functioning of the canals.

GEORGIAN ENGINEERING Canal aqueducts are rare and wonderful features. We were going to travel over the most notable, Sir Thomas Telford's 1,000 foot long, 120 foot high Pontcysyllte. D a n . the skipper.

than one fifteen, the width of the "wide barges" (never boats) used on the rivers.

A t o p the 14 stone piers of the Aqueduct, the canal is carried in a sheet-iron trough made in sections riveted together and caulked with a mixture of cow hair, horse dung, oxblood, and honey. This quaint recipe has kept it full and leakless since just after the French Revolution until today. To save money, it's only one boat wide—seven feet. On one side is a narrow sidewalk, on the other just a three-inch lip at water level. It's impossible to see the lip unless you lean well out, so we had the queasy sensation of a view from a boat that is usually only available from a low-flying airplane or a tightrope.

It was beautiful. The River Dee wound below and every hill was either wooded or manicured into farms. English fields are not as relentlessly rectilinear as ours. They were cleared and settled first, then surveyed, instead of the other way around. They're separated by hedgerows, not barbed wire. Another characteristic of the English countryside that makes canal boating so pleasant is the absence of suburbs. Settlement patterns were established before motorcars encouraged sprawl. Even today, what Britons call suburbs are independent, tightly settled villages. Sheep wander into the back gardens of householders who face the town's main street.

explained that without it, there would need to be 25 locks going down into the Dee valley and another 25 coming up the other side. Besides the expense, there would be a problem of getting enough water to work them and the time it would take to navigate them. Canals wind a lot for the same reason, serpentining along a contour line through the hills. Remember, said Dan, the canals were all dug by hand using gangs of Irishmen.

(They were called "Navigators", a word that survives as the British slang term "navvy", anyone on the shovel end of the building trades).

Digging a level trench, even a long one, is much cheaper than building locks and tunnels. Narrow boats dominated the first canals because it took a lot less digging to handle a boat seven feet wide

We operated our first locks the next day.

Narrow boat locks fit the boat like a glove, with only two feet clearance fore and aft and three inches on a side. The downstream sequence is to " d r a w " the two upstream paddles with hand cranks until the lock fills, open and close the gates for the boat, wind down the upstream paddles, draw the two downstream paddles until the lock empties, and open the downstream gates. Since the locks take only one boat at a time, Forget-menot had to be hand-lined through. If the Inland Waterways lockkeeper was looking the other way, a quick lift of the downstream paddles with the upstream gate open could help draw the butty

into the lock. If it stuck at the downstream gate, a quick lift of the upstream paddles could squirt it out. Both maneuvers are against regulations because they waste water and both take careful timing if the back surge they develop isn't going to neutralize the whole trick. We use them only rarely, saving them for long "stairs" like Grindley Brook where the locks empty into one another instead of into pounds where the Mabel could wait. W o r k i n g an unpowered 70-foot boat through five linked locks takes all the tricks available, thank you.

CROSS-STRAPS A N D T H E MYSTERIES OF NARROW BOAT HELMSMANSHIP Steering a canal boat pair is like taking a hook and ladder truck down a narrow street. Forgetme-not tows on "cross-straps", about four feet long. C o m i n g from the same cleat, they are separated by the high stemhead, specially shaped to keep them apart, and each runs from its side to a cleat on the opposite quarter of Mabel. At three miles an hour, the tiny rudder on the Mabel is useless for all but the most gradual course corrections, so when one of the many narrow, tight turns looms up, you must hold into the center left of the curve until the bow looks like it's about hit a cow. T h e n you cut back on the throttle, jam the rudder hard over, brace it there with your buttocks, and open the throttle all the way. While Jhe propwash acts like a stern thruster, the butty steerer pulls his rudder the opposite way, maintaining his course toward the cow. The butty's inertia rides it onto the outside cross-strap, pulling the inside quarter of Mabel neatly around. Just before the Forget-me-not noses into the bank, you center Mabel's rudder and pull the butty's bow around while Peter, Fiona, or Anne-Marie throw the rudder hard over to keep the stern from climbing the inside of the turn. The helmsman on the motor is responsible for bumps and strandings of the first third of the

butty, the butty steerer is responsible for any bumps and bangs further astern. An inept or poorly-disposed butty steerer can put the whole rig into a field. Three miles an hour seems like a harmless speed, but with their slow response and vast inertia, it only means that you have lots of time to contemplate your sins helplessly as whatever you've done w r o n g w o r k s its ponderous way out.

We steered both motor and butty. Of the two, butty steering is the most fun. It's quiet, for one thing. For another, the butty has an oversize rudder to provide control even without propwash and it's big, wooden tiller is called a "swan's neck". Delightful terminology. The rudder is decorated with rope fancy-work and painted with bright geometrical and floral patterns. They're called " a l u m s " because the best were made in Birmingham and that's how the " B r u m m i e s " pronounced " h e l m " . Peter was a devoted butty steerer and told us of enthusiasts who will only restore and cruise butties. They travel the canals by hailing passing boats with " H e y , mate, gie us a snatch five miles up the cut." If nobody obliges, they get out on the towpath and pull.

On wide, straight stretches, the butty is freed from the cross-straps and put on the end of a 100foot line. There it steers parallel to the motor's course but slightly to one side, out of the propwash. So arranged, the two boats sometimes reach speeds of four or even five miles an hour.

TUNNELS THEM

AND

HOW

TO

C O P E WITH

It's as strange going through tunnels in a boat as it is going across aqueducts. C a n a l tunnels may be long, but they're always low and narrow, their girth being determined by economics. In fact, most of them were c o n s t r u c t e d without towpaths. Bargemen had to lay on their sides on the foredeck and bracing themselves on "wings", walk along the tunnel's sides to "leg" the boats through. D a n said there was always a pub at the tunnel entrances where boatmen could sink a brace of pints to give them strength for the task.

On the other side was another pub for a couple of pints to catch their breath over. W h e n motors were introduced, it didn't take long for the barges to discover that if they tied the rudder hard over and put the throttle on dead slow, they could get the boat headed through the tunnel, bumping gently along one wall. Then they could step into the entrance pub, drink their pint, walk over the hill to the exit pub, drink another pint, and meet their boat as it came slowly out. Half the beer, but only a tithe of the effort.

OWNER'S NOTEBOOK: BOB A L L E N ' S W H I T E SHIP

by Bob Allen H o w strange, how wonderfully strange, to have people standing on the deck of a boat I built with my own hands....how dim now, the memory of those freezing days in the Issaquah shop, bundled up like a character from a New England Christmas card, trying to think as fast as necessary to keep moving physically in order to keep warm!!

SeaBird took me three years almost to the day.

She is just shy of 26' on deck and 32' from bowspirit to boomkin. The bowsprit, in addition to providing a place to hang a jib and threaten your balance in doing so, also serves as warning to big power boats in the locks that you are able to make quite ugly marks in their quite heavily varnished transoms. She draws 3'6" with her full keel. My boat is slightly faster than Thomas Day's original I think because she is made of fir and cedar rather than oak and cypress, making her about 40 percent lighter with the same sail area.

For those of you who may not know about SeaBird...She was the brainchild of Thomas Flemming Day, the editor and founder of Rudder Magazine. She started in the back reaches of his head as a boat that would be constructed by an amateur builder on a modest budget and be seaworthy. As these proved to be rather difficult parameters, Thomas tried to forget the concept, but the letters of inquiry kept coming in until he was finally duty bound to produce something. He got Charles Mower (whose name is mispelled frequently enough that I am not sure mine is the correct one) a leading designer of his age whose boats still frequent the waters of the East Coast, and other builders and designers to pool thier ideas and experience with small boats. SeaBird is like most of them and different from all of them. In those days, the idea of a seagoing small boat was something like an ocean spanning airplane in the days of Chas. Lindberg. SeaBird was built, something in secrecy, and tested for about a year before the plans were released. In that time she proved herself an admirable sailor. The center board was a problem as it took up all the room inside the small cabin. In 1904, three years after her launch, the boat was redesigned and the board removed with a full keel in its place. M u c h better inside room, but jerkier motions according to Day, a firm believer in inside ballast.

She is named for my late favorite aunt Harriet who died the year before I decided to build a boat in her memory. She has been a guiding spirit over

ONE LAST ENGINEERING FEAT Tunnels and aqueducts weren't the only way canal builders avoided locks. A few places put the boat on a pallet and hauled them bodily up an inclined plane. O u r cruise went by one of the most impressive alternatives, the Anderton Lift. The Lift was completed in 1875 and used two cassions to lift and lower narrow boats four at a time between the Shropshire Union Canal and the River Weaver Navigation, a height of 60 feet. The Lift was originally fitted with hydraulic rams that used the weight of the descending cassion to lift the ascending one. Later engineers decided this was "too complex" and substituted first steam and then electricity combined with concrete counterweights. The Lift is idle right now, but directly across the river is one of England's largest industrial cleanser makers, a huge plant covering many acres. Their entire output was shipped by

narrow boat until the lift closed.

The Anderton became uneconomical when commercial barge traffic dwindled and it was mothballed in 1968. However, the canals have become a major recreation for boating Britons and public pressure has convinced British Inland Waterways to spend around $3 million to get it back in operation. It's only half as high as the Pontcysyllte, but we can just imagine the ride.

Five minutes past the Lift and we were in rural England again. The River Weaver Navigation wound through the valley below, giving an occasional glimpse of a small ship cruising among farms and fields. As the ship locks came into view, we saw a Weaver Packet locking through, a sister to the one we had seen at Ellesmere Port Boat M u s e u m . We had come full circle. It was time to go home.

the project, and, during the dark days of planking when I was literally near tears trying to figure out how to get those damn boards cut and made into planks...she seemed there and a solution always emerged. Frank Prothero was my mentor and his help was of great value. The nearest thing a man can feel to giving birth, I think, is watching three years of his life suspended from a crane 20' over his head, dropping slowly toward the water, and, at that magic moment, cease to be a collection of wood, metal, canvas and paint, and become a waterborne thing alive. It was worth it.•

CALENDAR OF

EVENTS

November 1-8 LAPSTRAKE WORKSHOP 8:30 a.m.-5:00 p.m. each day, C W B Boatshop Simon Watts, Instructor Seven students will build a 20-foot lapstrake wherry. This is a replica of a 1909 San Francisco boat. The class is limited to seven students. Cost: $300 for C W B members; $325 for non-members.

November 15-22 LAPSTRAKE WORKSHOP 8:30 a.m.-5:00 p.m. each day, C W B Boatshop Simon Watts, Instructor Another 20-foot lapstrake wherry building project for seven students. Cost: $300 for C W B members; $325 for non-members.

November 21 CWB M O N T H L Y MEETING 8 p.m., C W B Boatshop Master sailmaker, Franz Schattauer, will talk about his career, beginning with square riggers in Germany, and discuss interesting jobs, colorful clients, and the state of sailmaking today.

November 22 & 23 O P E N H O U S E A B O A R D 1889 T U G ARTHUR FOSS & 1897 SCHOONER WAWONA 10:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m., ARTHUR FOSS at C W B - WAWONA next door T w o of the oldest vessels in Puget Sound.

Arthur Foss starred in the movie, "Tugboat A n n i e " and is one of the State Centennial fleet.

Wawona is the last commercial sailing vessel in the Northwest. She is a National Historic Site.

Dec. 9, 11, & 13 (a 3-session workshop) WOODCARVING WORKSHOP 6:30 p.m.-9:30 p.m. Dec. 9 & 11 and 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Dec. 13, C W B Boatshop T o m Parker, Instructor Focus on carving numbers and letters.

Students will learn the techniques of an experienced carver, and take home their work.

(A Christmas present?) Three basic tools are required. C o s t : $50 for C W B members; $60 for non-members. Limited to 6 students.

December 19 CWB OPEN HOUSE 5:00 p.m.-8:00 p.m., C W B Boatshop D r o p by for Christmas cheer in lieu of a monthly speaker. P u n c h bowl and hors d'oeuvres.

January 16 CWB M O N T H L Y MEETING 8:00 p.m., C W B Boatshop Bob K i n g has done a monumental restoration of his 36-foot Rhodes designed Evergreen C l a s s sloop Persevren. Bob will give a slide talk on his five-year crusade to transform a basket case into a dazzling, award winning vessel.

January 28-Feb 1 LOFTING WORKSHOP 8:30 a.m.-5:00 p.m. each day, C W B Boatshop Eric Hvalsoe, Instructor The class will loft a boat from a table of offsets.

The process includes laying lines, taking stem bevels, middle and bearding lines, transom and shelf bevels, mold deductions, mold and backbone patterns. Cost: $200 for C W B members; $250 for non-members. Limited to 6 students.

Note: W o r k s h o p sessions are limited in enrollment. To reserve your place, please send payment in full. For the lofting workshop, a $100 deposit is required. Questions? Call 382-BOAT.

CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING Y A S C H A ' S B O A T W A S H , 3134 Elliot Avenue #220, Seattle, WA 98121, 283-4343.

WANTED-CWB NEEDS DONATIONS OF: 1. Volunteer boat maintenance labor—a most satisfying therapy.

2. Boat pumps.

3. C o p y of the Catalog of Watercraft of Mystic Seaport, to replace the one someone borrowed and did not return.

4. Copier.

5. Cumulative index of WoodenBoat magazine.

6. $100,000 to complete everything we dreamed of building on Waterway 4.

F O R S A L E - " C l a i r e d'Lune" 36' A t k i n " E r i n " cutter built 1969 by W . H . White, Vancouver. R e d cedar on oak. W o r l d circumnavigation. $42,900 Canadian. 1-604-885-9676.

F O R SALE-Reluctantly but anxiously: Rebuilt 1946 H o o d Canal Water Taxi. A miniature sedan (20') with much new work, no rot, very well built from strip plank cedar over oak, with restored original Universal engine. Interior is bare, ready for your ideas. C o u l d be an excellent classic day cruiser or pocket yacht. Very sound, very cute, very good buy at $1,650. 485-7015.

2003 diesel, 200 hours, fresh-water cooling. Seven sails, sounder, 5+ channel V H F , log, much more.

Live aboard. Asking $35,000 U . S . Wonderful sailing boat, suitable for offshore. 1-604-685-0687.

D o u g or Sue. F O R S A L E — 74 19 ft. Hankin's Sea Skiff. Four sails, can be rigged as either marconi or sprit.

Includes: Seagull outboard, Sterling trailer, canvas boat cover, oars & rowlocks. $2900 or best offer. Call Sidney Collier 455-1672 home, or 329-7070 work.

C W B W A N T S - W a r e h o u s e space for storage and maintenance of our boats, close to C W B . Rent should be donated or cheap.

F O R S A L E - N o r d i c Folkboat, US 56. C a n be seen Alameda, C A . $5,900 or $6,900 with new 10-foot Herreshoff pram. (Pram available without Folkboat.) Simon Watts, 720 Bay St., San Fransicso, C A 94109 N O T I C E - T h e Simon Watts Workshops. F o r 1987 Boatbuilding Class Schedule write: 720 Bay St., San Francisco, CA 94109.

F O R S A L E - 1 8 ' Poulsbo with house; low hours 6.5 Yanmar diesel; $3,000 Pat/Dan 527-1613.

* Hulls cleaned, zincs replaced, lost article recovery.

ALL-RIGHT UNDERWATER S E R V I C E S , Geoff James owner 547-4403.

F O R SALE-1953 Hinckley custom 36' yawl, extensively restored, white cedar on oak, solid teak decks, newly caulked and fastened. Volvo

W A N T E D - H o s t homes for out-of-town students and instructors participating in C W B workshops.

Contact C W B at 382-2628.

FALL REGATTA A good regatta is like a Monet water scene. For a brief moment, a varied flotilla of small boats gathers, casting their colorful reflections across the still lake. Merry groups of people on the boats and docks are frozen in relaxed poses. Nothing especially happens, but it all seems just right, and you want to remain in the picture forever.

It seemed close to a Monet scene at our October 5th Fall Regatta. The weather was a perfect " 1 0 " Indian Summer day.

T h e reputation of C W B as a gourmet club cleverly disguised as a maritime museum, was further verified. O u r potluck l u n c h was highlighted by the lasagna competition. Nine dynamite lasagnas were submitted, and then wolfed down by the appreciative crowd. The crown and scepter (chefs hat and wooden spoon) were won by Kathy Drain of Shelton.

The races temporarily pick up the beat of the serendipitous scene. The Fixed Single-Person rowing race was won by Bill Huffington in a 16foot Whitebear skiff, followed by David Haygood, 14-foot Chamberlain Dory-skiff (the smallest member of the Dory Family) and Skip Price in a Chittagong junk. Skip received the " G o o d Samaritan" bottle of champagne for towing back the race committee boat whose outboard motor had conked out.

The sailing race winners: First, J o h n Hartsock and T o d d Blakely in the 15-foot Windmill; Second, Bill V a n Vlack, M a r k Cunningham, and Elise Jensen, 18-foot Hampton sloop; Third, Bill and Becky Huffington, 16 1/2-foot Rana sloop.

G i g racing has become the regatta's special

focus. Three 21-foot pilot gigs for four oars and coxswain showed up: Erica of Anacortes, Emily of Shelton, and Olga of Olga (Orcas Island). The races: Mens— 1st—Emily (Shelton team) 2nd—Olga (Olga team) 3rd—Erica (Anacortes team) W o m e n s — 1st— Erica (Anacortes team) 2nd—Olga (Olga team) 3rd—Emily (Shelton team) Mixed— 1st—Olga (Traci, C a r o l , Dave, G r e g , & Susie) 2nd—Erica (Shirley, Larry, C a r o l , Bob, & Erica) 3rd—£mi'/y (Valerie, M a r k , Cathy, Bill & Melody) There was a challenge between a C W B mixed team of Faye, Karen, Eric, Mike and Jacqueline, rowing Erica, and T e a m Olga. Olga won again.

If you like Monet, please join us at our Spring regatta.

KEEP T H E C U P O N L A K E UNION Mike Wagner is training for the international radio-controlled miniature 12-meter sailing race in San Diego, December 13. He will be matched against skippers from New Y o r k , California, England, and Japan. C W B has six 12-meter models donated by AG Industries which members can use. M i k e will be practicing at C W B on Saturdays from noon 'till 4 p.m., and he welcomes challengers to help sharpen his skills.

Please join in our campaign to win one for The Center.

SEA

ADVENTURE

On Saturday, November 29, from 1-3 p.m., children and adults can experience a bit of life at sea aboard the schooner WAWONA. This three masted schooner, build in 1897, is the last lumber and codfishing vessel left in the Northwest.

A gathering of chantey singers from the U.S. and C a n a d a will present songs and stories of the sea. Y o u can learn to tie a "monkey's fist" and take this fancy knotwork home. There will be short films on historic sailing ships. Dress warmly.

Suggested donations: $2 adults, $1 children.

The WAWONA is moored on Waterway 4, just west of C W B . More information: Colleen Wagner, 447-9800.

CWB MEMBERSHIP If your membership is about to expire (see date of expiration on your mailing label), please renew soon!

The annual membership dues are as follows: Student/Senior Citizen $ 10.00 Individual 20.00 Family 30.00 Contributing 75.00 Benefactor 150.00 Sustaining 500.00 Whether or not it's time to renew your membership (your renewal date, month and year, is printed on your Shavings mailing label), please consider a year-end donation.