Windjammer Days
Boothbay Maritime Explorers
This year Friends of Windjammer Days is highlighting the thrilling adventurers that members of our community have made over the years. We are sure there are many more but the folks highlighted here were nominated by our committee based on our personal knowledge of each one. The ages vary from 23 to 83. Take a look at each highlighted explorer on our website and look for one each week to be featured in the Boothbay Register .
If you would like to meet some of the explorers, mark this date on your calendar, for an informal Meet & Greet at Oceanside on Monday, June 26th, 3:30-5:00.
Each of our schooner sponsors have chosen an inspirational explorer to celebrate during our Windjammer Days Festival. These explorers will be invited to Linekin Bay Resort* for a dinner to be held in their honor.
*A special note of appreciation goes out to the Linekin Bay Resort for generously sponsoring this celebration.
Nowadays Herb and Doris Smith live a relatively “quiet” life since they have retired to their self built log home. Among other pastimes, Doris now kayaks and Herb pens books and sails on the Appledore Child, but their lives over the past several decades have been anything but quiet.
Herb and Doris first came to Boothbay Harbor in 1974 when they sailed the Appledore I, a 49 foot schooner that Herb had just built. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Bangor Savings Bank for being the Heritage vessel sponsor.
Although born outside of Maine while his father was stationed in Germany as a career US Army officer, Captain Brad Collins has lived in Maine for most of his life. He has resided in the Boothbay Region since the mid 1990s, first on Hodgdon Island and now Barter’s Island. He also attended college in Maine, graduating from Maine Maritime Academy with a BS in Nautical Science and a minor in Oceanography. Brad operated ships for 45 years and retired in 2021. For the first 23 years after graduation, he operated oil tankers. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Valley Beverage for being the True North vessel sponsor.
Bruce and Maureen Kinsey first met the summer of 1972, during college break while working at The Rocktide Inn Restaurant on the east side of Boothbay Harbor. Little did Maureen know their future would include many maritime adventures, most notably an annual voyage on their sailboat from September to May for seven years. Bruce first learned to sail as a child, spending summer vacations in East Boothbay while visiting his grandparents. Maureen on the other hand, first experienced boating on one of Boothbay Harbor’s tour boats. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Jeff Suyematsu and Laney Hebert for being the Eagle vessel sponsor.
I am a boatbuilder and a sailor. I have sailed my entire life and have been a boatbuilder since 1972. But mostly I was a partner and companion with my late wife Judy Sandick and with our four kids, David, Sarah, Jasper and Charlotte. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Mark and Mariann Powell for being the Harvey Gamage vessel sponsor.
Terry is a lifetime boater. He started his journey as a young boy cleaning and crewing for family and friends. He also hauled a few lobster traps with his surrogate grandfather leading to one of his high school summer jobs as crew aboard an offshore lobster boat fishing out of Boston and Gloucester. These trips were 8 -10 days long, and the heavy wooden traps were the size of refrigerators. He sharpened his sailing skills over another summer on a schooner which was being delivered to Grenada. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Rugged Seas for being a sponsor.
As a skilled sailor and navigator, Cameron McLellan hails from a family of multi-generations of seafarers. On the paternal side, the McLellans have hundreds of years of fishing in their bones with a few spar markers on the bank of the Kennebec River in the mix. The McLellan’s fished the Grand Banks, George’s Banks, and the Gulf of Maine several generations back. On the maternal side, the Murphys were full-rigged ship captains. With this heritage and a level of comfort on the sea, there was no question from an early age that Cameron would continue the tradition and make his living on the water. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Forj for being the Isabella vessel sponsor.
Kathleen Jones is now well known as a local designer and co-owner of Kerr/Jones Gallery in East Boothbay, but for a span of three decades she and her late husband George traveled extensively in the seas of the Eastern and Western Caribbean and along the coast of Maine.
A native of Ohio, Kathleen graduated from Ohio State. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Pepsi for being the Oliver Hazard Perry vessel sponsor.
Glenn grew up in Boothbay on Hodgdon Island. He always loved working around and on the water as a young boy. He enjoyed clamming, worming and collecting seaweed for local lobster pounds and worm dealers. When he got older, he worked on the charter boats in the harbor and helped Captain Winslow on his tugboats. Attending Maine Maritime was a natural fit. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Tindal & Callahan Real Estate for being the When and If vessel sponsor.
George H. McEvoy
“Messin’ Around in Boats” has been a large part of George’s life. He remembers as a toddler having his father rent a wooden rowboat to go rowing and exploring on Sunday afternoons on a lake near his childhood home. During his early teens, his parents purchased a house on Southport Island which included an 18’ centerboard sailboat. Not knowing a thing about sailing, he would row out to the boat on its mooring with his father and figure out what did what on the boat to make it sail. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Pine State Beverage for being the Tyrone vessel sponsor.
Annie Wilcox grew up with a strong foundation on the water in the Boothbay Region. She spent many summers as a child at her grandparent’s house on Sawyers Island (Bud & Ann Logan), messing around on the family’s Boston Whaler. She attended the Boothbay and Southport sailing schools, acquiring familiarity with all things aquatic. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Linekin Bay Resort for being the Bowdoin vessel sponsor.
Sewall’s love for the ocean first began when he was in grade school lobstering with his Uncle Earl Brewer, Sr. In 1977 he made his first trip on a trawler fishing with Richard McLellan on the Sea Bring. He later became captain at 19 on the 82 ft Irene’s Way which was built for Richard at Goudy and Stevens in East Boothbay. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to LaFayette Hotels for being the Eastwind vessel sponsor.
Don Demers first came to the Boothbay Harbor area in 1964 after his grandparents built a cottage on Ocean Point. For the first time he saw schooners and was “transfixed” with gaff riggers and the local fishing craft. Since no one in his family sailed or boated, Don learned about the ships from observation and the many books that were supplied to him by his grandfather’s best friend Judge “Chet” Marden who had an extensive marine library. Judge Marden allowed him to take one book at a time to study which led Don to make drawings of the vessels and build crude ship models. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Knickerbocker Group for being the Applejack vessel sponsor.
Nan and Chip Davison have had a lifetime on the water. Both grew up sailing but on opposite coasts. Nan sailed on the west coast out of San Francisco and Chip sailed on Long Island and along the New England coast. In the mid 1970’s both embarked on longer voyages. Nan lived with her family on their 60 ft ketch for a year, sailing from San Francisco to Greece. Chip sailed from Maine to Puerto Rico as first mate on the Harvey Gamage. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Rusty Court is well known in these parts as a fisherman and lobsterman, but he also has quite the maritime history beginning in 1961. It was in that year that Rusty entered the Coast Guard and was stationed in Washington, DC as part of President John F. Kennedy’s Honor Guard. The Honor Guard presides over ceremonies such as at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and is present when visiting dignitaries arrive in Washington. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to The Eldridge for being the Alert vessel sponsor.
John Albaum’s boating history began at an early age at the Lake Placid region of Florida and also here in the Boothbay Region and progressed to a full time maritime career. Entering Maine Maritime in 2001, he graduated in 2005 with a 3rd Engineer’s License. During college he worked for the Boothbay Harbor Whale Watch. His first job was right after college in the fall of 2005. John worked on an oil tanker in Alaska, shuttling from Kenai to Valdez with occasional trips to Washington and Hawaii. He was able to get his 100 ton Captain’s License which allowed him to run the Argo, Harbor Princess and the Bennie Alice during his time off from sea. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Shoreline Capital for being the Sycamore vessel sponsor.
It took 14-year-old Barry Gibson almost two years of lawn mowing and snow shoveling to save up $300 to buy his first boat in 1965, a 10-year-old lapstrake 15-footer built by the E. M. White Co. here in Maine, powered by a 1956 30-hp Johnson outboard. He’s been on the ocean ever since. Originally from Winchester, MA, Barry first came to Boothbay Harbor in the spring of 1968 with a high school buddy whose parents had a summer cottage on Spruce Point. Both hired on as deckhands on Capt. Bob Fish’s sightseeing boats Marabno II and Nellie G. IV and the Squirrel Island ferry Nellie G. II run by Bob’s father, Ray. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Boston Beer for being the Oliver Hazard Perry vessel sponsor.
A serendipitous meeting set the stage for a lifetime of cruising, long-distance sailing and ocean racing for an Edgecomb family. Gale and Charlie Willauer met on board the R/V Westward in 1978 as the ship departed for the open ocean. That pivotal 6-week voyage on Sea Education Association’s 125’ steel schooner WESTWARD took Charlie and Gale from Woods Hole, MA to Bermuda and north again to St. Pierre and Miquelon - French Islands off the coast of Newfoundland and marked of the beginning of their 40 years together. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to J. Edward Knight for being the Virginia vessel sponsor.
One of Nat Wilson’s earliest memories was summering on Fisherman Island and learning to row in a dory with his brother Gregg, sister Janet, father Jack and his un cle Jim. As they grew stronger, they would make trips to all the other outer islands in a fleet of two dories and skiff Beloved. Click here to see the rest of the article.
Our sincere thanks to Bristol Marine for being the Isaac H. Evans vessel sponsor.
“Life’s roughest storms prove the strength of our anchors.”