Workers are restoring PT boats in the 1902 factory this month. (Guardia Architects)

A forgotten relic of the steamboat era is sailing back to life, thanks to the preservation efforts of a New York City developer.

Retired Brooklyn attorney Robert Iannucci plans to transform the former Cornell Steam Boat Company building, located in the Rondout Historic District of Kingston, N.Y, into the Kingston Maritime and Transport Museum. The $500,000 renovation of the century-old structure is scheduled to begin next month.

"It's a really wonderful space, almost like an industrial church," says Huntley Gill, an associate for Guardia Architects, the firm overseeing restoration. "Right now we are taking the building back to its original configuration."

Several boats, including lap-strakes, PT's, tugboats, and a drydock, will go on display once the museum opens next summer, and classes such as a boat-building workshop will be offered.

Originally the machine shop for the Cornell Steamboat Company, the industrial-style structure was built around 1902. Formed in the mid-1800s, Thomas Cornell's company was a major force in the Hudson River region's once-thriving towing industry. After the company closed in 1958, the building became part of a lumberyard and also artists' lofts.

"For years, it was kind of a derelict building," says Ann Loeding, president of Friends of Rondout, an organization committed to preserving Kingston's waterfront.

Iannucci, who paid about $1 million for the brick structure a year ago, has plans to acquire other Kingston properties as well, and to develop a community of retail shops, housing, and museums. And as far as the Cornell Steamboat building renovation goes, area preservationists support him.

"We have a refreshingly hopeful view of this development," Loeding says. "It's a really important element and can serve as kind of an anchor."

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