❖ The Trilogy of James L. Davis ❖

The Trilogy of James L. Davis
James L. Davis author (1934-2015)
The slipcase containing the trilogy.
From the library of the Saltwater People Historical Society.

Some of you may have noticed this title on the log list of fifty favorite maritime books. From the accompanying artwork, one may guess the delightful prose is for all who are young at heart. This is a hand-crafted, exquisitely illustrated set of poetry published in 1986 by Washington State artist, James Davis (1934-2015.)
      Jim had fond memories of following the mouse track to Blind Island in the San Juan Island Archipelago, in the mid-1980s. He was artist-in-residence for a week-long workshop open to all ages on the central hub island of Shaw in the San Juan Islands.
      The first 100 sets were wrapped beautifully in a wooden slip-case; one of those is archived in the growing collection of the S. P. H. S. library.
      If anyone knows of stray volumes that have become separated from their boxed set, an adoption agency has been set up for the lost mice. We'd be glad to receive any donated stragglers, so the out-of-print volumes can be reunited and circulated as a set.

❖ Farewell 2009 ❖ Ahoy 2010

Photo by Debra Madan
on board the good ship
MORNING STAR.2009.

It was a productive and enjoyable founding year for Saltwater People Historical Society. Mariners, historians, and interested parties from several islands have come together to share and collect stories and remnants of our earlier maritime antics.

It was a pleasure to have the help of the following people:

Miles McCoy who donated a framed 14" x 24" vintage photo of the Schooner AZALEA when she was the flagship of the codfishing fleet owned by Robinson Fisheries, Fidalgo Island. This photograph serves to illustrate the archived notes shared by Ellen Bruns Madan, written by her father Eber, of his two seasons sailing as a member of the AZALEA crew in the early 1920s. Eber was born on Lopez, grew up and married on Shaw Island, and then moved with his wife and family to Orcas Island, where he had an interesting land-based career.

William B. Evans donated huge new signal flags from the Tatoosh Island weather station where he was stationed in the 1950s. The flags are larger than the home where they currently live in the warm and dry. With the flags came Pacific Ocean charts, a finely illustrated drawing of Bellingham Bay and Fairhaven in 1891, related posters, a shell-back certificate issued by the USN in 1929, and THEN there's the mounted King Crab specimen that once graced the former Warshall's Sporting Goods store in Seattle. The species is not native to our region, but some of the local fishermen were involved in that fishery. Just try me... I'll find a connection to our archipelago.

Former fisherman Jon Boyer has shared an antique steamer trunk and some glass floats from his personal collection. Kit Africa, Dan Levin, Poul B. Olsen, and Schattauer Sails people have donated or made possible line drawings of vessels from their private files. Skip Bold parted with a wooden bilge pump and a life-ring from his boat, the CORAL SEA.

Taking liberty to slip back one year, flying over the Shaw Island Community Center, there is a gift from 2008. It is the ship windvane designed, crafted, and donated by steamboater John M. Campbell. It features the lumber schooner CAMANO, to commemmorate her 1919 connection to a local sailor, Capt. Lyle E. Fowler. John also made a windvane that sits atop the Orcas Post Office.

Fine books and journals were added to our reference library. We have these good people to thank; William B. Evans, Mr. and Mrs. Les Gunther, Robin Paterson, Mary Schoen, Gordon Tweit. To the rescue came angels Neil and Angela Bryant with two seven-foot wooden book cases to shelve the growing library.

In an earlier blog you learned of the generous donation by Louise Thomas -- the Old Town canoe once seen paddled throughout our county by S.J. County Engineer/Surveyor Errett Graham.

Oceans of thanks also to Louellen McCoy for her fine photo editing skills, John Kennell for some family images of the former pilot schooner GRACIE S; for care packages that come from Kae and Robin Paterson. Debra Madan facilitated the purchase of two pieces of marine art painted by Orcas islander Michelle De Long. Dave Yansen earns points for locating and hauling the heaviest contribution... a piston from the Washington Ironworks main engine of the dearly departed VASHON which he salvaged from the wreck site and donated to us recently. What can I say, some of us loved that boat. The piston has been underwater since 1986; it's being cleaned up before it is ferried out to SJ County.

Kit Africa traveled from Port Townsend to present our first program --- his childhood memories of sailing to Tahiti with his family on board Sterling Hayden's WANDERER in the late 1950s. A donation from sailor guy Mike Douglas made it possible to copy drawings that were loaned to us by Kit.

Captain Tony Lee, MORNING STAR, and rigger Brion Toss sang themselves through a wonderful presentation of their efforts with the restoration of the historical tall ship ELISSA.

To each and all of you and to any that I've temporarily forgotten, please know that firstly, you are adored, and secondly that you are important and necessary to this mission. Many thank-yous from the middle of my main.

❖ THE PACIFIC COAST CODFISH COMPANY FLEET ❖

Schooner JOHN A 

Undated original from the archives 
of the Saltwater People Historical Society.©

"The three-masted codfish schooner JOHN A was launched in the Eureka, California yard of Peter Mathews, in 1893. She was 131.7 feet L with a 32-foot beam and a 9.8-foot depth of hold. The gross was 282.4-tons; a very fine sailing vessel for her small size.

      The JOHN A was the first schooner of the Pacific Coast Codfish Company fleet to come to Poulsbo. In 1911 my father, Captain J. E. Shields, and others formed a new fish processing company named Pacific Coast Codfish Company (PCCC.) A processing and storage plant was constructed on the shores of Liberty Bay. They purchased the three-masted schooner JOHN A in southern California with Captain John Grottle as the ship's master. The vessel was brought north with a good supply of salt for the preservation of the first year's cargo. The JOHN A sailed to the banks near Sand Point, Alaska, and also near Sanak Island. All fishing was done from one-man dories launched each day from the schooner and returned to her in the evening with the day's catch.

      A good catch resulted, and the fish plant in Poulsbo began winter operations. The salted fish were removed from the vessel, scrubbed, and stored in wooden tanks holding 20-tons each. A work crew was hired to further process the fish. Some saltfish was dried in the sun while other fish had skin and bones removed to be packed in one-pound packages for shipment to the various stores. Thus, a new industry came into operation and a winter payroll resulted.

In 1913 the three-masted schooner CHARLES R. WILSON was purchased. She was constructed in Fairhaven (Eureka,) California in 1891 for the lumber trade, but was then laid up. She was 150-feet L with 35-feet beam x 11-foot depth of hold. She was rated at 345-tons gross; she could land nearly 500-tons of cured cod.

      The company purchased other sailing vessels, all without engines, including the three-master C A THAYER, in 1925. The THAYER was built by Danish-American Hans Bendixen in Eureka at the same yard as the CHARLES R. WILSON, also for the lumber trade. She was listed at 452-tons gross. She could land nearly 600-tons of salt cod which may explain why she was the last commercial sailing vessel on the US west coast and the last to operate out of Poulsbo. She landed her last cargo in 1950 with Captain Ed Shields in command.

       Another sailing vessel of the PCCC fleet, probably the most famous, was the SOPHIE CHRISTENSON, a four-masted schooner built in Port Blakely in 1901. She was built for the lumber trade and for hauling general cargo. She was 180.6-feet long with a 38.9-foot beam and a 13.4-foot depth of hold. She first came to Poulsbo with Captain John Grottle, and last in 1941 with Captain J.E. Shields, her famous skipper. She carried a crew of 22 dory-fishermen, a dressing crew, and cooks to make a total of 44 men.                

      When the war broke out in 1941, the US Government took possession of the JOHN A, the C.A. THAYER, and the SOPHIE CHRISTENSON. Only the C.A. THAYER returned to the fishing trade after the war. The CHARLES R. WILSON operated during the war years delivering cargos of salt cod every year except in 1944. During this time she was under the command of Captain Knute Pearson of Poulsbo.

      During the late 1930s to 1941, the codfish plant provided employment for up to 40 persons, some men, and some women. For the men, it was work on the fishing grounds at sea during the summer season of five months, and work in the fish plant in the winter.

      After the war, conditions returned to near normal as far as the worldwide need for food was concerned. Commercial mechanical refrigeration came into more prominent use and the need for salt preservation passed as frozen fish became available in all of the grocery stores. Thus came the end to this fishery in 1950."

  From: ABOUT THE BOATS

By Captain Ed Shields (1916-2002)

Poulsbo, WA.

Captain James Edward Shields established his reputation from the age of 17, when he went to sea to help his father crew the SOPHIE CHRISTENSON into the Bering Sea and the history books. During the five-month fishing trip, the 45-man vessel set the all-time American record for codfish, hauling home an astounding 455,000 cod. He earned a Masters Degree in Engineering from Harvard but never once turned his back to the sea. Some believe his "crowning touch" was his six-year effort to write the incredible Salt of the Sea: The Pacific Coast Cod Fishery and the Last Days of Sail. The artist Shields remarked that he knew he was the only one left to write the story. Soon after the completion of the manuscript, in the words he chose for his salty father, he "crossed the bar," at the age of 86-years.

❖ SURVEYING SAN JUAN COUNTY ❖ BY OLD TOWN CANOE

Mr. Erret Graham in his Old Town Canoe (Guide Model),
2 July 1953, Indian Cove, Shaw Island.
Canoe Island, WA., in the background.
His son, Ernest, and one daughter stand close by.
From the archives of the Saltwater People Historical Society©

Mr. Erret M. Graham (1877-1974), a graduate of Butler University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, had a full career as a civil engineer with the railroads in the east. He and his wife, Helena, moved to Squaw Bay on Shaw Island in 1941, where he ordered his Buff & Buff equipment and began his second career as a land surveyor and official engineer for San Juan County, together totaling 25-years. 
       His favorite means of transportation was his green canvas Old Town Guide Model canoe; the two became a familiar sight amongst the islands. 
      The highly respected gentleman, his pockets stuffed with homemade cookies, was always referred to as Mr. Graham. He prided himself on being on time for his appointments when meeting with landowners around the County. It was a long paddle to some of the outer islands; he often stayed overnight for a lengthy survey contract but rarely delayed his trip for rough weather. In 1965 he was seen paddling his canoe around his home island at the age of 90-years. On his 91st birthday, he circumnavigated Lopez Island--solo.

      It is with great goodwill from one of our supportive members, Louise Thomas, that the Saltwater People Historical Society has become the recipient of Mr. Graham’s wood/canvas craft used extensively throughout the islands from 1941 to the 1960s.


      If you have any memories about this remarkable mariner, still fondly remembered in SJ county, please consider documenting them by email to the admin or click on “comments.” We are also interested in adding photos and drawings to Mr. Graham's file. Thank you.

❖ Schooner FANTOME ❖

FANTOME
Background photo donated by Nick Exton.
Foreground photo from the James A. Turner Collection, S. P. H. S.© 

"The black and white hull with its golden figurehead, its masts tall against the sky, became a familiar landmark in Seattle during the WW II years. The 1,200-ton, four-masted FANTOME was anchored in Portage Bay near the Seattle Yacht Club for so long she seemed part of the family.

      Her keel was laid in Italy during WW I, originally for a destroyer, but work stopped when the war ended. The Duke of Westminster bought the keel and on it built a floating palace, which was delivered in 1927. The Duke later sold FANTOME to an American who kept her for a year and then turned her over to a ship broker who sold her to A. E. Guinness, of the famous stout brewing family. Guinness sailed her all over the world.

      In the late 1930s Guinness had the FANTOME in Alaska, and while he was there England declared war on Germany. Rather than risk his magnificent yacht to submarines or warships, he anchored her in Portage Bay. (In 1939 Seattle was a neutral port.)

      The normal complement aboard the FANTOME was 35, but while she was in Seattle, only three lived aboard her. From time to time tours were given to help worthy causes. The caretakers, Mr. and Mrs. Long, made friends with SYC members who lived aboard their boats moored at the club. 

   

L-R: Joe Jones, Bill Jones, from longtime Decatur Island family.
Broker Phil Lewis.
Original 1950 photo from the archives of the S. P. H. S.©

       In 1951, FANTOME was sold by the Guinness estate for $50,000 to William and Joe Jones of Seattle, who moored her at various locations in Lake Union and removed her furnishings and stores. In 1953, she sailed for Montreal, supposedly to be scrapped." 

      Above text by James R. Warren, The Centennial History of the Seattle Yacht Club 1892-1992

1969: Michael D. Burke, Windjammer Barefoot Cruises purchased FANTOME, gave her a reported $6 million make-over and registered her in Equatorial Guinea.

1998: FANTOME, Capt. Guyan March, was lost in 100-mph winds of Hurricane Mitch off the coast of Honduras and Guatemala with all hands (31).

The tragedy was reported by Ross Anderson for The Seattle Times, 4 Nov. 1998 and by Knight Ridder Newspapers in The Seattle Times of 8 Nov. 1998.

There is another post on this Log about the tragic loss of the FANTOME. Please click HERE.