❖ STERNWHEELING ON THE SKAGIT ❖

BLACK PRINCE
ON 3866
1901-1956
On Dead Man's Slough above Sedro-Woolley 
with a tow for Bradsbury Logging Co. Top deck areCapt./Mrs. Charles W. Wright, son Vernon, Mrs. Bird, cook.
Main deck: L-R, F.M. Elwell, Frank Anderson, deck hands 
and Wesley Harbert, fireman.
Original photo from the archives of S.P.H.S.©

Though so many years had passed, nostalgic twinges gripped the writer, at times, as he seemed to hear the melodious whistle, faint and far away, of the old sternwheeler Black Prince as she boils up the Skagit with cool-headed Capt. Forrest Elwell at the wheel. 
      He can still hear people say, upon the sound of the whistle, "here comes the old Black Prince."
      Highlights of this historic steamer are contained in a letter received recently [1964] from Captain Elwell:

      "In the late summer of 1900, Capt. Charles Wright sold the City of Bothell and then the Snohomish and Skagit River Navigation Co was formed by Capt. Charles Wright, Capt. Charles Elwell, and Capt. Vic Pinkerton. It was then decided to build a boat for towing on the Snohomish and Skagit rivers.
      Capt. Elwell made the hull model and Bob Houston was given the job of building the Black Prince."
      Work was started in the winter of 1900, at the Ferry Baker Mill on the Snohomish River where the Canyon Mill stands today.
      Dimensions of the Black Prince were: Hull, 93-ft, LOA, 112-ft, 19-ft B, depth of hold, 4.6-ft, 150 G.T. according to the captain. When the hull and superstructure were completed, she was towed to Seattle by the tug Nellie Pearson, where a pair of 10 x 48 steam engines and a 100-HP brickyard boiler, 150 pounds working pressure were installed.
      "After completion, the Prince came back to Everett under her own power and then went to the Skagit to tow logs and piling," Elwell wrote.

BLACK PRINCE
photo postcard mailed 1912.
Photograph by Bayley
Click to enlarge.
from the archives of S.P.H.S.©

      The first crew on the Prince in 1901, was Capt. Elwell; Capt. (Engr.) Wright; engineer Mike Hertzberg; Capt. Pinkerton, Forrest Elwell, deckhand, and Wes Harbert, fireman.
      "In the late summer of 1901, she made a trip between Novelty and Tolt. In 1902, the Prince took a tow from Haskell Slough (near Monroe) to the mouth of the Snohomish River. 
      On 7 July 1903, loaded 50 tons of machinery at Mount Vernon  ✪ ✪ ✪ (click on "read more")

❖ SWINOMISH TRIBE IN WW II (updated)

"It was a proud Andrew Joe, 
unofficial chief of the Swinomish tribe
of LaConner, Skagit County, WA.,
where he saw his 12-year old daughter, Vivian 
smash a bottle of champagne across the bow 
of a 204-ft Army barge built at the 
Sagstad Shipyard, and watched the barge 
slide with a splash into the Swinomish Slough."

      '

        Champagne, flowers––everything,' he says, 'great doings.'
The Indian of old, with his war whoops and war paint, is gone, but the Swinomish know their way around in wartime. The site of the little Sagstad Yard is on their reservation and was leased from them. Thirty of the 85-yard employees are Natives
        Thirty of the tribe's young men were in the armed forces, most of them in the Army. One gave his life for his country in Italy. The shipyard workers all buy bonds, under a payroll-deduction plan.
        The Swinomish attracted attention several years ago when their aged totem carver, Charles George, carved a totem pole for the reservation. In a place of honor near the top of the pole was the Great White Chief's President Roosevelt. George said the honor was by way of recognition of the Great White Chief's generosity in providing $16,000 in W. P. A. funds for recreational facilities.
        Andrew Joe, in addition to being a leader of the tribal community, is perhaps the only man in the world with a brother named Joe Joe. Joe Joe fishes and trucks fish...
        Andrew Joe, who is 52, said four tribes were contained and placed on the Swinomish reservation by the government.
        'It was supposed to be just a temporary reservation; that was back in the late 1870s, said Andrew. 

        The Swinomish leader is a great admirer of his father. 'He had a great spiritual gift. I remember when I was a boy and my father's brother-in-law was shot in the ankle with a shotgun while hunting. Two white doctors worked on him a long time, and they could get only one shot out of the wound.
        Then someone went for Doctor Joe. He put his mouth to the wound and sucked out every shot––15 of them––with one suck. This feat won 'Doctor' Joe the undying respect of the white physicians', Andrew Joe said.
The white workers in the shipyard speak well of their Native American co-workers.
'He's a darned good man,' one of them said of Garfield Day, Indian fastener in the yard.

Robert Charles, age 23 
Sagstad Shipyard planerman,
LaConner, WA. 1944
Original photo from the
archives of Saltwater People Hist. Soc.©

      

Many of the Natives have worked at Sagstad yard since it began operations late in 1941. One of those is Robert Charles, above."
Writer unknown. Published in The Seattle Times, September 1944.
From the archives of the Saltwater People Historical Society.

❖ ANTIQUE ANCHOR LOST AND FOUND ❖

These three great photos of the anchor during a spell
without her blanket of water in the new crate.
 Port Townsend, WA.
Photographs shared by Captain Flanagan©.

The maritime history talk in the Pacific Northwest newspapers and society newsletters has revealed  what has been "underground" for several years and underwater for many decades. 

      The artifact found by Doug Monk off Whidbey Island in 2008 has now been brought to the surface and made known to the public––it will be an interesting study to follow. There are fascinating comments submitted to the published newspaper columns, some from learned historians; those publishers and dates sited in the image below.

      Historian Steve Grimm of Seattle is giving a presentation on the research data that convinces the team they have found Captain George Vancouver's anchor, written up in the expedition log books as lost at Strawberry Bay, near Cypress Island, Skagit County, WA  in 1792. 

      Grimm's talk is scheduled for this coming Friday 20 June 2014 at the Northwest Maritime Center, Port Townsend.  Below is a clip from the site of the Northwest Maritime Center in Port Townsend, WA. 

Aside from the possibility of the anchor being left behind from Capt. Vancouver's 1792 exploration there are no other known artifacts in Washington State surviving from that visit.  
     

From the archives of the Saltwater People we can share this 1952 b/w  photo of a very colorful mural depicting Capt. George Vancouver's visit to Kealakeakua Bay off the island of Hawaii in 1792. The English explorer is being welcomed by King Kamehameha I; this artwork hung in the transport THOMAS JEFFERSON, a former commercial passenger liner, occasionally visiting Seattle.

See a 2007 article from The Vancouver Sun newspaper found on the Bellingham Maritime Museum site here.

St. Peter's Churchyard, Petersham, Surrey, Eng.

Original, undated photo from the 

archives of the S. P. H. S.

Click to enlarge.

     A quote from a book in the Saltwater People collection, Vancouver's Discovery of Puget Sound, Professor Edmond Meany; Binford's and Mort, 1957:

      "Professor George Davidson, now of the Univ of CA, was for more than forty years engaged with the US Coast and Geodetic Survey on the Pacific Coast. A few years ago, in a letter to the present writer, he said, 'I have gone over every foot of the work done by Vancouver on this coast and I wish to say that he was a great big man.'
      This is a monument greater than the naming of an island, more enduring than an engraved slab of marble. The whole world will always honor Vancouver for his brilliant achievements in the science of geography."

❖ HEWING A CANOE ❖

LaConner, Skagit County, WA.

ANDREW JOE (1892-1960)
  carving a 54-ft canoe, 1952,
LaConner, WA.
Original photo from the archives of the S. P. H. S.©

Andrew Joe, 60-yr old Swinomish Indian, has carved about 30 dugout canoes in the past 42 years––but none was so important to him as the 54-ft racer now being hewn from a cedar log.

      Not only is the canoe the longest he has made, but it will carry the 11-man first team of the Swinomish in the Pacific Northwest Championship race 30 May, at the Lummi Stomish Water Carnival at Gooseberry Point, south of Bellingham.

      "This will be the first time the first team has used one of my canoes in the big race," Joe said from among flying cedar chips. "Our second team once found out one of my canoes was pretty fast, though." 

Racing canoe carved by Andrew Joe.
Four of the five canoes in the race were swamped
during the first mile of the three-mile race. 
Dated 6 July 1941; photo from the archives of the S.P.H.S.©

      Joe was referring to a 50-ft canoe which swamped with others competing in the last Coupeville race, 6 July 1941. The second team had a good lead in his canoe when choppy water cut them out of the race.

      The large cedar for Joe's new canoe was cut before the snow last winter. He has been working on it in his spare time for about a month.

      Most of the work of carving a dugout is done with an adz, the use of which Joe has developed to an art. Much work with a plane and finer cutting tools is required to make the lines smooth and true. When completed, the sides of the hull will be less than an inch thick.

      Worm or "dead" spots in the log make patching necessary, Joe explained. Patches are fitted and glued into the hull during shaping.

Words by John Van Devanter for The Seattle Times, 12 May 1952.

❖ ❖ ❖ SAMISH ISLAND, Birthplace of the MAGGIE and the MARY ❖ ❖ ❖

From a 1954 Interview by historian Lucile McDonald.

     

SAMISH ISLAND, 1954

Click image to enlarge.

Original photo from the archives of the 

Saltwater People Historical Society©

"Samish Island is one of those places you drive past, or sail past, dozens of times and never do visit.

      Only a few of the oldest residents, like George Hopely, 80, and his wife were around when Samish was a heavily timbered hump of land entirely surrounded by water. At low tide, they say, a man in rubber boots could tramp across the oozy mud flats to higher ground on the mainland. It is stuck out in plain sight from Chuckanut Drive, Padilla, and Samish Bays, but to get there one has to leave Hwy 99 north of Burlington and drive west six or seven miles. 

      Samish Island recently acquired a public water system that did away with the necessity of hauling the vital liquid by the tankful to livestock and crops on some of the farms.

      It is the most important event in that morsel of Skagit County since Samish ceased to be an island. It is a peninsula now, with very little to show that it ever was insular except its general appearance from a distance.

      Until a few months ago water was obtainable on the island only from wells. Samish has no streams of its own and issues of the Coast Pilot in the 1880s warned skippers that it was no place for watering vessels. Now all of that is remedied. Day Creek on the mainland was dammed and its waters are being carried nearly 20 miles to Samish.

      The Hopelys, the oldest residents of the community, settled there when Samish was one of the main ports of Skagit County with three docks, the same number of saloons, a hotel, and a cannery employing 25 Chinese. For a time it had a rival townsite platted by a Georgian named George Allen and named for the leading city of Atlanta, in his home state.

      Travelers bound inland to the logging camps made an overnight stop at Samish as a rule. Hopely recalls the sternwheel and side wheel steamers anchoring a distance off the mud flats and putting passengers ashore in rowboats. When a long dock was built at the island, they unloaded freight there, ferried on flatboats with sails, up the slough to Edison.

      The first job George Hopely had was night-watching for the Samish Island salmon cannery, which had a Chinese crew directed by Mr. Lord, the superintendent, and his son-in-law, Mr. White, the bookkeeper.

      Hopely's duties included filling and cleaning lanterns and receiving and counting fish when boats arrived from the Nooksack after dark. That was in 1888, when the cannery was new, and was the only one in the area, none having been built as yet at Anacortes.

      Hopely had come to Seattle eight years earlier. His widowed mother, with six children to support, aimed to get a homestead. She kept a lodging house at first, then found 160 acres on the Samish River. One of her sons took a pre-emption claim of 40 acres next to it.

      'When we came here to go to the claims 33 whites, including children, lived on Samish Island. Dan Dingwall (we called him Dan Dingle) and William Dean were the first two to settle here. Watson Hodge, George Echenberger, and George Dean were other early homesteaders. Several were married to Indian women', Hopely said.

      'My mother bought a five-acre place here on Samish so we could run back and forth and wouldn't always have to stay on lonely Vendovi. One of my nephews was born out there. His father had to act as a 'midwife' and bring him into the world. 

      We sold meat and wool from the flock, taking the mutton to Anacortes and Bellingham. The wool was worth 10 to 15 cents a pound. We packed it in big sacks and carried it to Seattle on our 32-ft schooner. We had 175 sheep on the island; that was about all it would carry.

      I was 15 when I went to Vendovi. I worked here in Samish the year before and the cannery paid me $50 a month, which we thought was wonderful. The cannery ran several years, then shut down for lack of fish after bigger canneries were built.'

      Seafoods were what attracted Indians to the area. 'The Indians liked the big horse clams best. We'd see them on the beach smoking both clams and fish strung up on sticks supported on forked pieces of wood. They camped in mat tepees or under pieces of canvas.

      The Indians once had a long house here on North Beach. It was maybe 100 feet long and smokey. Cowidgeon and Old Harry were the leading Indians in it. The longhouse seemed to have a number of families, who lived here the year around. There was an Indian cemetery at the inner end of the island.

      Samish Island has been logged three times', Hopely says. The first person to have a logging camp there was Dan Dingwall in 1867. A history book relates that two years later he and Thomas Hayes opened a store near the Indian camp.

      Hayes went away and William Dean became Dingwall's partner. Dingwall was postmaster of Samish in 1870 and Dean started a store of his own in 1873.

      All of this was before Hopely's time. He doesn't remember hearing Dean or Dingwall ever mention logging. Dean built a schooner, the MAGGIE, for freighting among the islands and to Anacortes and Bellingham. One other boat also was built at Samish in the early days, the MARY F. PERLEY, a sternwheel steamer.

      Mrs. Hopely, though a later arrival that her husband, recalls the bull-team logging days and the smell of dogfish oil being tried out in big kettles on the beach to make grease for the skid roads.

      'Why, when I came here there was so much timber on Samish Island you could get lost in your own forest. It was a true island when the tide was in. We went everywhere by boat', Mrs. Hopely says."

Above text by author, historian Lucile McDonald for The Seattle Times, January 1954.

      

      

❖ MARINE SUPPLY AND HARDWARE ❖ Rags to Riches in Heritage and History

Words by Bonnie Graham McDade for the former Washington State Ferries publication Enetai, 14 January 1983.

Marine Supply and Hardware,
Commercial Street, Anacortes, WA.
Web photo by Elizabeth K posted in 2012.
Mural art by Bill Mitchell.

"Steve Demopoulos, has taken the heritage his Greek grandfather built and is revitalizing one of the most intriguing 'discoverable' historic businesses in the Pacific Northwest.
      If you could stand behind the ancient cash register––it doesn't even ring up sales tax––your feet would settle into the furrows made by thousands of impressions on the equally ancient, oiled oak floors where clerks have helped customers pay for their wares during the past [100] plus years at Marine Supply and Hardware in Anacortes.
Making our way in the late morning fog still held heavy to the ground by the wintery idiosyncracies of a coastal fishing town, the wide sidewalk leading toward the Anacortes marinas at the north end of Commercial Street are stirring, low, whistles booming through the seemingly softened air. The historic old rambling building hugs the earth as it undulates over the expanse of its entire city block resting place. Resplendent in a new coat of burnt orange paint and yellow trim, following the same intricate detailing put there many years ago by its charismatic owner Mike Demopoulos, the grande dame of the Washington fishing fleets northern reaches, is taking on yet another spurt of renewed energy.
When Mike Demopoulos made his way from Greece to the furthest reaches of the then US--Anacortes, Washington--Marine Hardware was not even a glint in his eye. It grew, however, from the glint that became the Anacortes Junk Co, named apparently after a courageous and energetic Mike, dubbed by the locals 'Junky Mike.' Picking up all sorts of flotsam and jetsam in and around Anacortes (he even used to take the horse and cart all the way along Reservation and Snee-Oosh roads into LaConner and back, picking up any kind of junk he though somebody would want). His junk company grew and grew.
And his philosophy still lives on.
Grandson Steve Demopoulos, new owner of the shop, remembers his cantankerous and tough grandfather telling him, 'It's only junk, until someone needs it."
And who can scoff at that reasoning. The modern-day garage sale speaks to it with ever-recurring frequency.
It was Mike Demopoulos who opened his junk company near the Anacortes waterfront and became the friend and benefactor of most the northern coast fishing fleet. If Anacortes is nothing else, it is indeed a fishing capital of this particular PNW and its colorful fishing fleet, still very much in existence today, was the mainstay of that economy at the turn of the century.
It was Mike Demopoulos, born in the tiny Greek town of Bralos––about 70-miles north of Athens––who immigrated to the US at age 17. He spoke no English, and when a policeman in Portland, OR, heard him speak, he steered the young Mike to a Greek restaurant where he started his new life.
'All Greeks work in a restaurant sometime in their lives,' laughed Steve.
Mike worked his way up the coast to British Columbia doing almost any kind of job there was available. When he settled in Anacortes, he was experienced, spoke English some, and ready to take on the world.
Starting with what most see as a pile of scrap, Mike Demopoulos bought and sold his way to a minor fortune. Some people say he owned almost all of Anacortes before he died--summer of 1980.
And by the looks of the insides of Marine Supply and Hardware, he bought and sold just about everything else, too.
A trip through the store is an antique buff's dream, a do-it-yourselfers haven, and a walk back through history that will tickle even the most hardened of souls.
In a building that grew like topsy, with add-ons, and more add-ons, where the floors sag in places, the lights hang from single cords, and winds blow through the cracks in the walls, there is very little you can't find.
Today, Steve is organizing what is there. And what is there is worth a whole day of just digging through.
It's a literal museum of 'good stuff'. Mike was a past master at buying surplus––especially government surplus, just about the best you could get. And much of that surplus is still there. Like lots and lots of old wooden nail kegs, barrels, and barrels of different sized and same sized washers, nuts and bolts. Wandering back through the gerrymandered warehouse, there are old seamen’s lamps hanging on the wall, blocks of every size and description.
'You're looking at my granddad', says Steve, a bit wistfully, a bit proud, and with a lot of that Greek fortitude, obviously passed to him through the generations.
From the five-gallon cans of Knickerbocker Pure Penn-Perafin Motor Oil (where the can itself is probably worth as much today as the oil inside in sheer nostalgic value) through miles of the 'the best ropes in town,' to the Home-Laughlin heavy-duty china, it's really a truism what the sign says--'ask for it, we've got it."
     A link to Marine Supply and Hardware, Anacortes, WA., can be seen here

❖ WASHINGTON STATE FERRY AGROUND AT ANACORTES❖

WSF ferry HYAK, 

14 April 1986,

Captain Terry Lee

Location: reef near the ferry landing,

Anacortes, Fidalgo Island, Skagit County, WA.

Photo by Richard S. Heyza for the Seattle Times©

Original photo from the archives of the S. P. H. S.

Like its sister ships the ELWHA, the HYAK will go down in San Juan folklore for running aground. Unlike the ELWHA, the HYAK's tale of woe is not romantic.
      The HYAK ran aground not because of a lady in the wheelhouse but because of paint in the wind and a captain's concern for the working conditions of his crew.
      Skipper Terry Lee was trying to keep the wind off workers while they were painting the outside of the deck. So after stopping at Lopez, he headed to Anacortes without turning around, as usual, to keep the wind to their backs.
      When he arrived at Anacortes on schedule at 10:40 AM he swung the boat in toward shore before heading away from the landing so he could "back" in.
      The boat got too close to shore and went aground on a reef a few hundred feet from the dock, ferry spokeswoman Pat Patterson explained.
      Chairs slid to one side, a video machine that was not secured wobbled, and riders were caught off balance. Some vehicles slid into each other on the car deck and were damaged.
      There was a minus 0.6-foot low tide at 1:37 pm at Anacortes, so the water beneath the big boat continued to drop. The vessel tilted until it had more than a 15-degree list. A tug secured a line and pulled to help keep it upright.
      The boat sat there, helicopters and planes buzzing around all day. Finally, at 6:30 pm when rising tides and two tugs worked in tandem, the HYAK came free. 
      "It was like a fair ride––when we first hit, the deck started going up and up. It felt like an earthquake. The whole boat shook," said Tim Thomsen of Friday Harbor, who returned to San Juan on the 7 PM ferry.
      "They announced for everyone to put on life jackets. That was scary. Then they said not to abandon ship until we were told to. That was really scary," said Marty Robinson of San Juan.
      Response to the crisis was excellent, riders said. The Red Cross showed up. The ferry system paid for some inconvenienced customers to stay overnight in motels. The system paid for meals and long-distance phone calls.
      Ferry officials also took photos of every vehicle so the damage could be recorded.
      Patterson said she expects claims to come in soon. Several vehicles were damaged slightly. No one was injured. Two persons were taken to Island Hospital to meet their doctors' appointments.
      Patterson said the ferry system is investigating the mishap. The HYAK will be put up on blocks in Seattle. A rudder and propeller appear to be damaged.

WSF M.V.  HYAK, 

at Todd Shipyards 

18 April 1986.

According to Don Schwartzman,

 ferry system marine superintendent, 

new plating may be needed for 

a 40-50-ft gash in the hull.

Photo by Vic Condiotty for the Seattle Times©

Original from the archives of the S. P. H. S.

The superclass ferry could be back in service next week if the damage is limited, Patterson said.
      The ELWHA (that ran aground off Orcas in 1983), was called in to replace the HYAK temporarily.
      From the air, the mammoth ferry looked uncomfortable leaning on one side with a line extending to a tugboat that was keeping the ferry from listing any further on the reef, about 200-ft from shore.
      "It's really listing," said pilot Si Stephens, who flew circles over the boat with county commissioner Doug Corliss. 
      There were 250 passengers and 127 vehicles on the ferry when the mishap occurred. Passengers were evacuated by a Coast Guard ship, a fishing vessel, a tugboat, as well as by lifeboats [from] the ferry.
Above text by Allison Arthur, Friday Harbor Journal, 16 April 1986.

Washington State Ferry HYAK:
1967: One of four superclass ferries built this year at National Steel and Shipbuilding Co.,  San Diego, CA.
382'2" L x 73'2" B x 18'6" D. Four diesel-electric engines. 
2,704 G.t./ 1,214 N.t. (admeasurement)

      A reporter from the Seattle Times wrote that there were only four 15-passenger life rafts on the HYAK at the time of the stranding.
If anyone was a passenger this day and would like to leave a comment, it is easy to do in the space below this post.

❖ ANACORTES FERRY DOCK 1960 ❖

The Ship Harbor ferry terminal, February 1960,

just prior to opening.

Original Photograph by Parker McAllister.

New accession from the archives of the S.P.H.S.©

"A new ferry terminal is taking shape at Anacortes.
      When it is finished, the time for a trip between Anacortes, the San Juan Islands, and Sidney, B.C., will be shortened by about ten minutes and the time required for a boat to get into port, unload, load, and get out again will be considerably less than it is now.
      The new terminal is on Ship Harbor, just east of Shannon Point, about two nautical miles west of the present Anacortes terminal. It will cost c. $700,000. It is being built by the Port of Anacortes, which is leasing it to the state for 30 years. It is expected to be completed in May.
      Officials of the State Ferries are enthusiastic over the speed with which boats will be unloaded and loaded at the new terminal."
Text from the Seattle Times, 6 March 1960
   

❖ SCHOONER WAWONA'S BONES ❖

Schooner WAWONA
Photo by Capt. H. H. Morrison
Submitted by author.

"February 26 2011, was a special morning for Roy and Annie because we were out of bed by 4:00 AM to meet Les Bolton, Executive Director of the Grays Harbor Historical Seaport Authority, and a crew of other volunteers in Montesano, WA. By 6:00 AM we were off to rescue WAWONA's bones off Sandpoint Way in Seattle.

       The weather was not especially cooperative, with a temperature of 14.8℉, and a recent snowfall lingering in the shadows, but the roads seemed clear so we were off on our adventure. The Black Hills section of Hwy 8 was coated with compact snow and ice near McLeary, but we slowed down with a 2-axle equipment trailer behind, and carried on without a slip. 

       WAWONA's bones were the salvaged portions of the stately old lumber schooner, WAWONA, that was built in Eureka, CA, in 1897. She had served well as a lumber schooner, moving redwood and fir lumber to ports up and down the west coast until 1914, when she was converted to a cod fisher. One of her captains was Ralph E. Peasley who became famous as the model for Capt. Matt Peasley, the 'fictional' hero in Peter B. Kyne's adventure novel Cappy Ricks, or the Subjugation of Matt Peasley, published in 1916.

      In 1914 WAWONA was purchased by the Robinson Fisheries Company in Anacortes, WA, loaded with tons of salt for preserving cod, and with provisions to last 38 fishermen for six months, sailed to the Bering Sea. At the fishing grounds 24 dories would fan out in all directions, each with a fisherman and his hand lines. They fished all day long to fill each dory with cod fish before returning to the mother ship at nightfall. When the fog closed in, the fisherman and his dory were isolated and alone except for the periodic sound of the WAWONA's horn which provided the location of home.

       Those days are long past and today WAWONA would be making one last trip. After riding at anchor in Lake Union for many years, she had finally been scrapped and her knees, rigging screws, blocks, bowsprit, capstan, keel, and other bones were waiting for us in the corner of a parking lot near the NOAA facility on Sandpoint Way. The day was mostly clear but a biting wind blew in off the lake as we went about our business. With the help of a cranky old fork-lift the trailers and pickups were loaded with pallets and boxes and lashed down for their ignominious last voyage through Seattle rush hour traffic to the Grays Harbor Historical Seaport in Aberdeen, WA."

Written by Roy Pearmain
For Saltwater People Historical Society
June 2011.

Schooner WAWONA 
 winter moorage, Clam Harbor, 
West Sound, Orcas Island, 1951.
Courtesy of Mary Schoen, on shore at this location.

According to Eric Lacitis, Seattle Times staff reporter, the WAWONA, in 1970, was the first vessel to be placed on the National Historical Register of Historic Places.

      All of Seattle's other sailing ships either have been broken up for scrap or sold to other ports for maritime museums.

      In 1963 funds were raised in Honolulu to purchase the 4-masted bark FALLS OF CLYDE for a maritime attraction.

      The Schooner C. A. THAYER was rescued from her "pirate" role on the beach at Lilliwaup, Hood Canal, WA, to  undergo major reconstruction before Capt. Adrian F. Raynaud and her salty crew sailed down the coast to San Francisco Maritime. This passage is well documented in The Schooner That Came Home by Harlan Trott, Cornell Maritime Press, 1958.

      According to Joe Follansbee, the Anacortes History Museum, the Northwest Center for Wooden Boatbuilding, and the San Francisco Maritime Museum, all received pieces from the deconstructed WAWONA."

Anchor winch from the Schooner WAWONA,
c. 10,000 pounds.

 Schooner WAWONA 
keel section, February 2011

Salvaged bowsprit of the Schooner WAWONA
Southbound Seattle to Aberdeen, February 2011.

Salvaged Blocks from the WAWONA.

WAWONA's  rigging gets loaded, too.
All salvage photos courtesy of Roy Pearmain, 2011.