❖ Square-Rigger with 42,000 Square Feet of Canvas❖

Square-rigger KURT
215217
Built in 1904, Glasgow, Scotland.
This big beautiful vessel has seating on deck to host
guests for the annual Astoria Regatta
in this year of 1915.
Click image to enlarge and see all the people!
Original photo from the archives of
the Saltwater People Log©

MOSHULU (ex-KURT)
Mrs. H. W. McCurdy with a scale model,
part of a marine exhibit made by Dr. George E. Thompson.
The small label says: "This model of the MOSHULU
was made from the original blueprints and rigging plans
while she was still in American water. The model design
was carefully checked and approved by 
Capt. P. A. McDonald,
who was her last captain under the US flag."
1943 photo.
Click image to enlarge.
Photographer unknown.
Archives of the Saltwater People Log©

"Many years back while at Port Angeles, WA., when his ship was loading lumber, Captain P. J. R. Mathieson, master of the MOSHULU, described her as a 'whale of a vessel' with beautiful lines, a clipper bow, and a fine run aft. He further described her as very lofty, with long yards, and tall masts; measuring 335-ft in length with a beam of 47-ft and a 26.6-ft depth. Each of her four masts measured 165-ft from deck to trucks and the three lower yards were each 96-ft long. Two-thirds of her 1,230 blocks were of steel, and the standing and running rigging, nearly all steel wire line measured no less than 21 miles. The square sails carried on the yards on each of the masts were 1 course, 2 topsails, 2 topgallant sails, and staysails between the masts, 1 foretopmast staysail, and four jibs. She had a total of 35 sails which spread over 42,000 square feet of canvas and was fitted with a donkey boiler and engine used for working the cargo, shifting the vessel's berth and working the windlass through a wireline messenger. She had six powerful hand winches for hoisting the three upper topsails and three upper topgallant yards; six brace winches for canting the yards, and six capstans for heaving in on the sheets of the courses as well as one capstan for turning the windlass by manpower.
      The MOSHULU, according to Mathieson, was the ultimate in big steel square-riggers."
Jim Gibbs, Pacific Square-Riggers (New York: Bonanza Books, 1977), 149.