❖ HOLY BOWSPRIT ❖

UNDAUNTED
221305
2,266 G.t./ 2,094 N.t.
267.5' reg. L x 46.4' x 23.9'
Blt. 1921 Portland, OR.
Cabin boy "Silvers" Hatchitt age 16
sailing Portland to Australia in 1922.
Original photo from the S.P.H.S.©

"The bowsprit is one of the principal spars of a sailing ship. Originally it was a foremast, but early sailors discovered that taking the foremast forward improved the sailing of their vessels, and a tendency once started did not end until the mast was nearly horizontal and forming what we called the bowsprit. It extends the sail plan beyond the vessel itself, providing support for the jibs, the hardest-working sails (per unit of area) in a vessel."
Above text from: the classic Fifty South to Fifty South by Warwick Thompkins, Sr.  W. W. Norton & Co. 1938. 

Bowsprit
The famous 32-ft Ketch SUHAILI
March 1966
Leaving Tanzania for London, with 4 aboard.
Keystone photo from the archives of S.P.H.S.©

Bowsprit,
TOLE MOUR, 1989
938740
Steel hull ship built on Whidbey Island, WA.
 leaving for the South Pacific.
Original photo from the S.P.H.S.©

Bowsprit
Etoile
Tall Ships Race 1964
from Plymouth, England to Lisbon.
215-tons entered  by the Naval School at Brest, France. 
Original photo from the archives of S.P.H.S.©