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9K views 38 replies 19 participants last post by  matt1970 
#1 ·
Boat Making Apprentice program

On April 10, 2009 my son David and I went to the St Michaels Maritime Museum which is on the Chesapeake Bay. In their Boat shop they have an apprentice program where you build a boat on Sat and Sundays. As many people that show up work on the boat. It may take a period of months to finish the boat. You don't have to go every day in the weekend or every week.

The Museum web site.

The Apprentice program.



Notice the price on the completed boats.

The current boat under construction.




It is modeled after this boat.



This is another boat that is completed.



The row boat that was used in the movie "Failure to Launch" with Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker, where they were in a row boat on a small lake was made in the apprentice program at the museum and was sold to a buyer in California. It hung off the roof of the boat house for a couple of years before the buyer picked it up.
 
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#9 ·
8iowa: as we left the museum we went across the Oxford ferry. Friday was the opening day so we were right on time. they were closed down for the winter.

It looks like the bay is about 1/2 mile across at the two docks. so I don't know if a cable arrangement would work. The one there now is a power driven ferry that will take 7 or 8 cars. We were lucky because the gate was dropped and they saw it coming up so they raised the gate and let us on. It's a 30 minute round trip.

We drove there from St Michaels because if we drove to Oxford and the ferry wasn't operating yet it would have been about 45 minutes to drive around, and to get to St Michaels. The trip from the St Michael end was only about a 4 mile trip to find out if the ferry was operational.
 
#12 ·
There used to be and may still be a big wooden boat show in Seattle in late Aug or early Sept. I remember the dates because one of the wife's cousins brought his boat to a family reunion on the way home one year.
 
#13 ·
I just remembered a friend who was building a 20 some foot sail boat who had me haul the keel form him was getting a divorce. His ex decided to take a chain saw to the project one day in a fit of rage!! He had teh ribs pretty well done the last time I saw it. That was pretty much the end of that boat :-(( I don't know if he was able to slavage anything, but he heated with wood and was very short on $$, so I suppose it went in the stove.
 
#14 ·
Hi Karson;

You and David must have had a great time. I hope you stopped at one of those all you can eat seafood places.

I hope David understands how good of a father he has, and picks up your life habits.

Lee
 
#17 ·
Karson - Thanks for directing me to this. These are beautiful boats (and pictures). I'll have to find my way there someday. There is an antique boat museum up my way in Clinton, NY that provides some courses, but they're like a full 10 days instead of weekends. The museum is excellent though. Here's the link: www.abm.org
 
#20 ·
The Boat Yard

On April 10, 2009 my son David and I went to the St Michaels Maritime Museum, in St Michaels MD. It is on the Chesapeake Bay. As part of the conservation effort in the museum they rebuild wooden boats that have fallen in disarray. They rebuild them and may add them to their active collection or rebuild it for an owner.

Here is the current boat under restoration. The Caleb W. Jones. When completed it will return to an active boat to dredge oysters in the bay and also educate the public through fields trips on the bay.





The side planks are removed except for this one.



Holes were cut in the bottom to put in new bracing so that a new deck floor can be installed and keep rain from flowing into the the bottom when it gets started.

The bottom has these planks that will be replaced.



The nails in the sides are hand cut nails.




This is the top side of the boat as seen from the lighthouse.



A couple of boats that have been restored and are in their collection.

 
#29 ·
The lighthouse

On April 10, 2009 my son David and i went to the St Michaels Maritime Museum in St Michaels, MD. It is on the Chesapeake Bay.

They have a lighthouse that originally was in the bay but it has been removed. Because of the advances in boat electronics and GPS positioning, lighthouses are becoming obsolete.

This is the Hooper Straight Lighthouse that was in the Bay.



The only two pictures that I took in the lighthouse were the workbench and a table.





This is the lens that is in the top of the lighthouse.



It was lit by a flame from some mineral oil. It originally used fuel oil but in some testing it was determined that the mineral oil gave a brighter light.

Sorry I failed to take a picture of the lighthouse itself.

it had three water storage tanks that were made with wooden slats. The water to fill them came from rain water that ran off the roof. The spigot at the bottom dropped it's dripping water into a funnel in the floor that dropped the water into the bay.

Boats borough supplies once a month. Everything but food. The food was bought by the lighthouse keeper from a food allowance that was given to him and he had to bring it himself.
 
#30 ·
Nothing was said about that. I'm not really sure how the lighthouse was placed in the bay. Wheather it was on the bay bottom with screws or whether it was on a little island that was build around the base.

The write up states that was out in the water as remote as a desert island. But, it was placed where a known sandbar caused navigation problems.
 
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