In the last quarter of the 20th century St. Mary’s County Maryland still had outhouses, tobacco farms, fishing villages and plantations. One of the last live radio stations in America carried the only available daily news. There were a couple of traffic signals, a couple of dress shops, small community grocery stores and a Navy base that most military personnel considered a hardship posting.

Still, just as the first English settlers had determined 350 years before, there were always some who saw the remote and marshy peninsulas for what it is: a marketable paradise.



Sunday, April 1, 2012

Don't Tell Francis

July 2010

Now that the keel is in place the job becomes putting the skipjack back together with a mind to never having to do another restoration. Jack spends hours cleaning everything he can from the planking throughout. Even slivers of wood fallen between planks can complicate the swelling that must happen when the skipjack returns overboard. It is the swelling that finally makes her seaworthy again.

Jack is bursting with notions -- which is not unusual -- of what can fill the chinks. The last I heard he had taken to discarded pillows.

That is all I know about that.

Here is a video about how the re-fitting of the puzzle is coming along. In the video are Carpenter James Laws, Captain Jack Russell and Shipwright Benjamin Goddard.



(no endorsement of any other YouTube videos are made .... blogger.com just has issues with direct uploads .... this is just a disclaimer)

A half-inch must be OK. U.S. Coast Guard visited again yesterday to keep tabs and again approved of the work done.


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