A Massachusetts Fishing Town Restores its Last Schooner

Story by Margaret Guthrie / Nov. 8, 2002

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The schooner Adventure in drydock (Gloucester Adventure Inc.)

Approached from the ocean, Gloucester, Mass., rises up a low hill from a snug, deep-water harbor. Its houses, churches, and civic buildings face out to sea, as perhaps they should in a place whose economy until recently depended on the fisheries of the Grand Banks off Newfoundland.

These days, fewer trawlers frequent the docks, where the smelly bait store still sells bait to both sport and serious fishermen. At one of the piers, the last of the "Gloucestermen"—fishing schooners that sailed from Gloucester to fish out on the Grand Banks—hovers above the water, hauled up for restoration. The 122-foot schooner Adventure sits in drydock, its port side bared to its oak ribs. A $1.5 million restoration is under way, thanks to The Gloucester Adventure, Inc. "We're just a small nonprofit with a great big boat," says president Martin Krugman.

Adventure was launched in 1926 and spent her earliest days among the fleet of fishing schooners that plied the North Atlantic's Grand Banks in search of cod. These schooners carried several dories—small, flat-bottomed boats suitable for two fishermen on the open ocean. One rowed while the other baited the many hooks on the long lines trailing behind the dory as she was rowed back to the schooner, where the crew hauled in the lines and put the catch on ice in the hold.

Unloading a dory (Gloucester Adventure Inc.)

One of the biggest moneymakers in the history of the North Atlantic commercial fisheries, Adventure caught more than $4 million in fish in her 27-year career. On her best day, in 1943, she brought home 120,000 pounds of cod in 20 hours. She was laid up in Boston on November 3, 1953.

In 1954, Adventure was purchased for $6,000 and outfitted as a tourist boat. Staterooms were fashioned from the former fish hold, and she sailed out of Rockland, Maine, as part of a windjammer schooner trade for tourists.

When the boat's last captain and owner, Jim Sharp, retired in 1988, he offered Adventure "as a gift to posterity if I am in return offered assurance that she will continue to be cared for, prominently displayed as a monument to the history of Gloucester, and used for the education and pleasure of the public." And that is exactly what is planned for Adventure, now a National Historic Landmark, as soon as she is restored to seaworthiness.

Mayor John Bell has declared that Adventure will serve as the city's flagship and a "floating classroom" for Massachusetts schoolchildren. Grants for restoration have come from the Save America's Treasures program, the Massachusetts Historical Commission, the Essex National Heritage Area, and the city of Gloucester. Krugman's nonprofit envisions the ship serving as a memorial to the 5,000 souls lost at sea from Gloucester, seven of whom were from Adventure.

On location in Gloucester during the filming of "The Perfect Storm," Adventure had to be moved from her dock because it was used in the film. Director Wolfgang Petersen considered using the schooner in the 2000 movie but decided the boat was too big, Krugman says.

On the open ocean (Gloucester Adventure Inc.)

Mayor Bell is one of the volunteers working on the ship, and his wife has served on The Gloucester Adventure's board of directors. The town is committed to saving Adventure; a recent auction netted the organization the $50,000 necessary to keep the restoration going for another year while other fund-raising continues. The Dusky Foundation has put up a $100,000 challenge grant, which Adventure's on-shore crew must match.

Adventure's starboard side has been completely restored, and now the port side awaits the same treatment. Then the deck must be restored. It's going to be a more extensive and more expensive restoration than first anticipated; the organization needs to raise another $1.25 million.

"We could do a less expensive, less extensive restoration, but then she'd have to be hauled out and re-done sooner," Krugman says. "And she might not prove as seaworthy as she should be. We want to do it right."

Margaret Guthrie is the author of Racing to the Table: A Culinary Tour of Sporting America, published last month by Eclipse Press.

For more information or to donate money, contact The Gloucester Aventure, P.O. Box 1306, Harbor Loop, Gloucester, Mass., 01931, (978) 281-8079.

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