New album for those looking for designs under 20ft...

[Wild Dingo]

After receiving a new body of files from Anita I have again been delving into posting Al Masons designs... man these old fellas were good!! :cool:

Okay so the new album for those who are chasing designs under 20ft are here:

Al Masons under 20ft designs (http://www.imagestation.com/album/?id=4291486295)

As a taster...

Pretty Pickle

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid28/p796b83bbcbc8d609f5e5119eac589a8f/fd65a22f.jpg

And Stripper... ooops try "scud" ya dopey mug!! :rolleyes:

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid28/p41fc2efb524b51a01b7f88c6a9448dae/fd65a232.jpg

Now Ive got to clean up this mess!!! :eek: tongue.gif

Take it easy
Shane

[ 08-16-2002, 11:31 AM: Message edited by: Wild Dingo ]

[Wiley Baggins]

Anita and Shane, thank you.

[ 08-16-2002, 08:59 AM: Message edited by: Wiley Baggins ]

[Hugh Paterson]

MMmmmmmm
Nice boats Anita, thanks Shane, any chance of changing the name of the speed boat, before Goddam Saddam gets some BAD ideas. :eek:
Shug.

[AngWood]

Wunnerfull! Wonderbar! Esp. Cruisette...my kind of boat.

[Garrett Lowell]

I wish I'd seen these before I started on the Shellback.....

[Dave Fleming]

Geo. Kneass and Sons, operated a yard in San Francisco, almost adjacent to Bethlehem Steel's Shipyard and down a block from the Shipwrights Union Hall. It was still active when I began my apprenticeship in 1962. 2 years ago when I stopped bye the Hall to receive my retirement pin I walked around the old Kneass yard. Building was still there but seemingly deserted and what I could see of the nice waterfront docks and launching ways was in a state of decay. If memory serves me, there was a fellow who posted in the Forums that was connected with an organization that tried to use the Kneassfacility for a Boat Building School but it did not work out. Sadly the only even semi-active yard on the San Francisco waterfront is a little place with a Portugese name, next to the old Anderson & Christofani yard, my alma mater. A&C burned down in the 1970's and almost nothing remains to show that a boat yard existed on the site but the foundation and rails of the Marine Railway. :(

[ 08-16-2002, 03:16 PM: Message edited by: Dave Fleming ]

[A. Mason]

Hi Hugh, I suppose I could change the name of SCUD. In fact, it's original name in Al's manuscript was "H-Boom!" but apparently someone at "The Rudder" changed it. Would "Smoke" be okay? Or do you have another name you feel would describe the design?

[Of course, I can't change the name on the drawings themselves. I will never alter the original linens, so the name change would only apply to promotions.]

Anita

[Garrett Lowell]

Anita, I say leave the name unchanged. To allow Saddam to have any influence on this, I feel, would be ridiculous. Al named it, he liked it, and that's that. IMHO.

[gary porter]

Anita, Nice boats,,,I wouldn't change the name at all, your never going to make everyone happy. If you do want to change it then how about putting it back to the original from your fathers manuscripts. The boat will speak for itself.
Gary

[Wild Dingo]

Dave you okay mate?? :rolleyes: ...wandered a tad eh?? mmmmm was the rum a bit strong the other day? :D

You know mate... in all seriousness I think a book would be a great idea... all your knowledge experience and people it would have sygnificant value mate... Hang on!! Im bein fair flamin dinkum Dave!... Look back at your life!!... What youve done what youve seen and who youve worked for and associated with much of thats gone now... so a book! get it down before its gone too!!! :cool:

I know weve had our differences over the time mate... but what you know and have experienced is something we fellas today have little to no show in heck of getting to do... Imagine in 30 or so years {maybe less maybe more} when all the fellas of your ilk have gone to that great boatyard up there in Valhalla... what then?...

If no one writes this down its gone... oh history will tell its story written from a perspective of one not actually there from notes and bits and scraps of "what happened"... but the personal... the "this is what it was like"... can only come from you fellas!

Maybe SWIMPAL could do the writing for you or hire a "ghost" writer to do it... sit down with a tape recorder and tape it!... I know much of the Yamitjii history is oral history passed down through time from family to family son to son daughter to daughter... but now much of its gone or going as the old fellas fade away and the younguns get into city life and "civilisation"... so some people are out there taping the old ways the old words so they are down for history...

I dont know mate I just reckon you and all the old fellas should find a way to keep your/their knowledge and history alive...

Just my own rambling thoughts here... :rolleyes:

Take it easy
Shane

[Hugh Paterson]

Tut Tut Anita, I wuz just having a dig at the crazy one ;) the names fine and a pretty thing she is too, Scots men have always had a dry sense of humour, well thats my excuse and I am sticking to it :D Have you anything similar to SCUD in the 20ft plus size, shes nice but a bit short(ish), now somthing with a mid mount inboard instead of an egg whisk on the transom, Mmmmmm.
Regards
Shug.

[Wild Dingo]

Hang in there Shug mate... dont do anything drastic!!... don le a wee thing like tha be botherin yer yon kilt me laddie!... tis naught that a fine group such as we canna fix :D

Al has 3 power designs in the 20ft to 24ft range

Teal at 22ft x 6 ft-1 in x 1 ft-10 in
Toutog at 22ft 7in x 7 ft-9 in x 1 ft-11 in
Blackfish at 22ft 7in x 7 ft-9 in x 1 ft-11 in

Of course after that... you gots to go to the 30ft and up range! ;)

The other info is on... Anita's site (http://www.a-mason-na.com)

Just run down the page to the list at the bottom and click to go directly to the specifications page... mind you could also have a bit of a gander while your there fair bit of history in them thar pages pard! :cool: ...The site I think is but a small part of the design catalogue... but enough to give an idea of the scope

"Och nah graphics dingo matey" I hear you mutter.... but wait!!... what lurks on yon email thingamabob???... Hang on but a few tics and that may be remidied me wee scottish matey!...

OOOooooohhhhh... Anita??.... ;) Anita me dear! Heeellllooooo!! or as we say down here... Cooooooeeeeee!!! :D

Take it easy
Shane

[ 08-17-2002, 09:47 AM: Message edited by: Wild Dingo ]

[Dave Fleming]

Wandering a bit Shane? I think not. The CRUISETTE design on your Imagestation page of under 20 footers, clearly mentions Geo. Kneass as the builder of that A. Mason design.
I was merely posting what little I knew of the Kneass yard and what become of it.
The rest, well call it fleshing out a picture of what the San Francisco waterfront was like before the current sterile tourist driven version came into being.
I see the very same thing happening down here in San Diego now. I recently went to the San Diego Historical Society, to look through their photo collection of the SD waterfront. Lots of stuff that was, is no longer. Restrauants,hotels and now a damn baseball park and more hotels are taking the space where once stood fine boatyards and docks for tuna fishing boats that were driven out of the port and now call places like Guam, New Zealand home.

There are others with much more knowledge of what and how things were in the San Francisco Bay Area, than I. Harold Sommers of Wanderbird restoration fame comes to mind and still others besides he who have much knowledge about times past in the Bay Area.
There was a mainly photo book published some time past called grandiously, This Was San Francisco Bay or close to that. IMOOP, the author was not far off with his comments. Book still around IIRC.

Me write a book about my times in the yards, not bloody likely. Hell my own sons could care less about what I did or was involved in, why should others? Maybe someday I will get to finish my scribblings on tricks and bits of how to solve a sticky boat building problem, maybe........

[ 08-17-2002, 12:12 PM: Message edited by: Dave Fleming ]

[bainbridgeisland]

Dave Fleming

I served my apprenticeship at South Bay Boatworks in Redwood City. We had an Italian craftsman in the yard at the time by the name of Guy F%%%. Can't quite remember his last name. He claimed to be Foreman at Geo. Kneass and Sons for many years, 20, maybe. He was in his 60s in 1974. Would you remember the man? Perhaps even his last name?

Originally posted by Dave Fleming:
Geo. Kneass and Sons, operated a yard in San Francisco, almost adjacent to Bethlehem Steel's Shipyard and down a block from the Shipwrights Union Hall. It was still active when I began my apprenticeship in 1962. 2 years ago when I stopped bye the Hall to receive my retirement pin I walked around the old Kneass yard. Building was still there but seemingly deserted and what I could see of the nice waterfront docks and launching ways was in a state of decay. If memory serves me, there was a fellow who posted in the Forums that was connected with an organization that tried to use the Kneassfacility for a Boat Building School but it did not work out. Sadly the only even semi-active yard on the San Francisco waterfront is a little place with a Portugese name, next to the old Anderson & Christofani yard, my alma mater. A&C burned down in the 1970's and almost nothing remains to show that a boat yard existed on the site but the foundation and rails of the Marine Railway. :(

[Dave Fleming]

Sorry BI, but I don't recall any such name at the moment. In the 1960's Kneass was not really that busy mostly small craft and occasional small fish boat ala Montery type or similar. I poked my nose in there one time during working hours on go-fer run from the Balclutha on the Embarcadaro to A&C down in Hunters Point saw maybe 4 or 5 people in that big shed.
At the same time A&C had about 12 shipwrights, one apprentice ( moi ) and, 2 machinists and, 2 painters working full time and that little yard next door, gosh I wish I could remember its name? Something Portugese..Bros., it was had maybe 6 fellows working there. In fact when they had a corking job Dabber would be sent over to do it. Walter ignored them but Al seem to get on well with the 'Bros.'.
Bayboat worked at Richmond Boat Works and some other yards on NorthBay, IIRC. Perhaps he has more little grey cells left than I do.

<insert CRS type grin here>

[ 08-19-2002, 08:30 PM: Message edited by: Dave Fleming ]

[Bayboat]

Dave F.: That little yard next to Anderson & Christofani is the Allemand Bros. Boatyard, still operating I hear. John and Rene ("Flip") used to work at A&C, and about 1945 struck out on their own and have been there ever since. They must be well over 80 by now. They've outlived A&C, Kneass, and three or four other yards around the India Basin - Hunter's Point area.
Man, I'm working those little grey cells overtime. I started working in boatyards around the Bay in 1941, and left in 1962.

[ 08-20-2002, 02:05 AM: Message edited by: Bayboat ]

[Dave Fleming]

Yahooo, that is it Allemand and sounds more French than Portugese too. Boy was I out of whack on that one.
Yes they sure have lasted and as of last Mothers Day weekend were still there.
Still can't get over the ***fire*** that took out A&C so soon after it was sold, hmmm. I always wondered if the new owners let the night time guard go, to save a few pennies?