Met Reuel Parker Last Week

[teaksmith]

I had the good fortune to meet Reuel Parker last week while in south Florida working on a boat. I also got to see his latest project under construction, a stretched version of the 36-foot San Juan Sharpie schooner featured in The Sharpie Book. This new boat he's building under a temporary shelter in a boatyard is 45-feet long and and features a shallow lead shoe for additonal outside ballast. He's working on it 7 days per week and has done a tremendous amount of work in the short 9 1/2 weeks since he started.

Mr. Parker doesn't like to be interrupted when he's building a boat, but by visiting after 5:30 with a few cold bottles of ale, my partner and I were able to entice him into an enlightening conversation about boats and boatbuilding in general. You can see photos I took of the boat and read more about it on a blog post I wrote here: http://scottsboatpages.blogspot.com/2008/02/meeting-reuel-parker.html I also bought a couple of his books, signed of course, including his latest: The Voyages of Fishers Hornpipe.

[mcdenny]

Scott, Interesting story about Mr. Parker. Thanks for posting.

I'm a fan of his Commuter 44 power sharpie. Someday...

[teaksmith]

Hi Denny,

Yes, I know what you mean about someday. If I wasn't already in the middle of building a Wharram Tiki 26 I would be ready to start the 36 foot version of that same sharpie schooner, or perhaps the Terrapin 34. I'm a big fan of shoal draft and straightforward, simple construction. Reuel Parker is one of the best designers I know of for this type of craft.

Apparently, from what I've read on other threads here, I was lucky to get a few minutes of his time. He's a hard fellow to track down, and at the rate he's going with building that new boat, he won't be hanging around a Florida boatyard much longer.

[Banjo]

Thanks for sharing some of your memorable moments with us Scott.

I also have all Parkers books, easy reading and great reference material in the Sharpie book on the birth and evolution of the sharpie type vessels.

[Ian McColgin]

Finastkind.

[Bill Perkins]

His books are great references . For me the most important was "The New Cold Molding ". I'd like to build a crab skiff some day though , and if I do ,I'll really have to stretch to find a reason not to use his translation of the type to plywood .

[teaksmith]

Parker's building methods and adaptations of commonly available materials are great. I had read both The Sharpie Book and The New Cold Molded Boatbuilding before, but I am re-reading them now after meeting him and seeing in person how he's applied these techniques in the building of this new schooner. He told us when we were talking about the boat that he expected the material cost to be only $25,000. That's incredibly low for a 45' schooner at today's prices, but it is a sharpie, and just as Chapelle said, they are the most boat you can build for the money.

I'm really enjoying "The Voyages of Fishers Hornpipe" as well. I never knew that he lived such an adventurous and wild life. He is totally uninhibited in his retelling of the lifestyle he lived, and it's fascinating reading about how he lived in the back of a truck in a boatyard for years, building a 53' ferrocement cruiser with money scraped together from various odd carpentry jobs.

At the same link given in my first post on this thread, I've also posted the photos I took of Sarah, the 52' Exuma schooner he built years ago for a client. The boat is docked next to the yard where he is currently building his new boat. It's an incredibly beautiful vessel, and so well maintained it still looks new.

[Bill Perkins]

Your blog mentions the use of Tile Clad 2 on the interior . What is Mr. Parker useing on the hull exterior these days ?

[teaksmith]

Hi Bill,

Last week when I saw the boat he had the hull exterior sheathed with Xynole and primed with the white Tile Clad 2 on the topsides and the red Hi-Bild Tile Clad 2 primer below the waterline. He did mention that he used Trinidad bottom paint, but I forgot to ask him what he was planning to use for the final topside coats. On the interior surfaces that got paint the Tile Clad 2 was to be the finish coat.