Launchings

Tiger Shark was built by Community Boat Building 5th graders from the Harvard-Kent School in Boston. They launched it this summer along with 11 other Periwinkles built by their classmates.

Cristobal Verde, a shipwright from Sarteneja, Belize, started building this 16′ sailboat for an American living in New York City. Midway through the job, the boat was abandoned and left unfinished for three years.

My friend and I built matching row boats to Sam Devlin’s plans, originally called the 5X10, now called Bella. Nevin named his Theresa, mine is unnamed as yet. Despite the fact that Sam’s classes build these little rowers in a weekend, Nevin and I took five years to complete ours.

KIWI II is a development of New Zealander Richard Hartley’s Trailer Sailer 21 design. This boat was started as a retirement project by Kennith Tycer. Howard Berg purchased the unfinished boat in 1995 and with the permission of the designer added a bowsprit to improve its windward performance.

This is the “Sea Rover” from the Science and Mechanics Boat Builder Handbook (circa 1958). This was built over the past 2 years. It is plywood over oak frames. I had actually built the 15′ version of this boat when I was 13 years old.

Kees Bugel first built an 18' cedar pulling boat designed by Ken Bassett. From there, he moved to this more complex Lala design by Joel White. The boat is cold-molded and includes a small Volvo auxiliary engine.

Lucas Pharmer, son of Andrew Pharmer, is seen here standing beside LOUIE DA' BOY, a 15'8" x 33" Iain Oughtred McGregor Canoe. Andrew and Lucas built the boat according to the methods described in Ultralight Boatbuilding by Thomas J.

Jonathan White of Victoria, Australia built this Acorn dinghy in just five months. It is made of 6mm marine plywood and hoop pine with five coasts of varnish all around, and another five coats inside for good measure.

Richard Maldonado chose the 13′ QT Rowing Skiff design by Jim Michalak (www.jimsboats.com) for his first build. He wanted to build a boat mostly from found materials, and except for the luan plywood that he purchased, everything else was recycled.