By Clare Elsaesser

Joann was designed by L Francis Herreshoff with help of its owner, Waldo Brown…built in Lynn in 1924.. Owned in the 1950s by the actor Sterling Hayden, and still around… photo in Marblehead by WB Jackson.

Lofting is a dark art, for us it starts with translating scans of the hand written table of offsets written by NGH in 1928. For the most part this isn’t too hard, any anything that looks “off” we can fair in when we draw it. HOWEVER, the transom page is nearly illegible and the voodoo that they do isn’t giving us a curve that is even remotely fair. Thankfully the boat is readable so we will be pulling the lines tomorrow morning

Team Turtle Return for a Second Year

Hey folks, Kate Preston here. I’m back for another year of keeping you wonderful readers in the loop about all the happenings in Restoration Hall. In my very first blog post as a Student Ambassador back in September of 2017, I ended my post with “Check back over the coming 20 months, I’ll be filling you in on all the adventures, struggles, and sweet moments that come with building Beetle Cats. Fingers crossed, I can sail away at graduation in something I’ve built!” Lady and gents, that statement become true!! On June 2nd this past year, Team Turtle (as we were known) pushed away from the dock (may or may not have almost hit another dock) and sailed around Newport Harbor. Proud is an understatement.

To keep things rolling, we all went to our respective summer externships. I spent the summer at Arey’s Pond Boat Yard in South Orleans, MA. A place and business I highly recommend anyone visit. They were so patient with me as I learned the ropes in my first marine trades job. I was able to spend time at their waterfront rigging, canvas, and boat building shops. It was exactly the experience I was looking for, I can’t thank them enough! 

Now, let’s talk present day and future. All of you may realize that it’s already October (holy moly) and life in Restoration Hall has picked up. The first year class has arrived and are gliding through the first stages of shop safety, basic joinery and have already started on their Beetle Cat restoration journey. They’ve finished lofting, deconstruction and have flipped their boats onto their molds to begin building a new backbone.  

The second year class has found out our teams (of 6) and the boats we will be building over the coming 9 months. Follow us on our journey to finish restorations of a Herreshoff 12 ½ and Buzzards Bay 14’, and a replica of Herreshoff’s Wee Winn (pictured in order below).

Herreshoff 12 ½

Buzzards Bay 14

Wee Winn

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I am looking forward to another fantastic year at IYRS, as well as blogging about all the things we are learning. I apologize in advance if what you see here in the future makes you insanely jealous (just add that to the list of reasons you should follow your curiosities and come join us!). Till next time, happy reading!

Off Marblehead [Alden Triangle sloops] Leslie Jones, August 1932 Boston Public Library, Print Department, Leslie Jones Collection Accession # 08_06_012838 (CC BY-NC-ND)

13 of these boats were built in 1903 by Herreshoff for members of the Bar Harbor summer community. 5 later on made their way to Marblehead. Herreshoff in Bristol Rhode Island is considered to have designed some of the most beautiful boats ever built

The rising wind, by Montague Dawson, 1969

Off Marblehead Leslie Jones, 1932 Boston Public Library, Print Department, Leslie Jones Collection Accession # 08_06_012845 (CC BY-NC-ND)

NY40 MARILEE: Restoration of a Herreshoff Classic