Chapter 2

However, efforts to improve on the sharpie resulted in the construction of boats that had neither the beauty nor the other advantages of the original type. This was particularly true of sharpies built as yachts with large cabins and heavy rigs. Because the stability of the sharpie's shoal hull was limited, the added weight of high, long cabin trunks and attendant furniture reduced the boat's safety potential. Windage of the topside structures necessary on sharpie yachts also affected speed, particularly in sailing to windward. Hence, there was an immediate trend toward the addition of deadrise in the bottom of the yachts, a feature that sufficiently increased displacement and draft so that the superstructure and rig could be better carried. Because of its large cabin, the sharpie yacht when under sail was generally less workable than the fishing sharpie. Although it was harmful to the sailing of the boat, many of the sharpie yachts had markedly increased beam. The first sharpie yacht of any size was the _Lucky_, a half-model of which is in the Model Room of the New York Yacht Club. The _Lucky_, built in 1855 from a model by Robert Fish, was 51 feet long with a 13-foot beam; she drew 2 feet 10 inches with her centerboard raised. According to firsthand reports, she was a satisfactory cruiser, except that she was not very weatherly because her centerboard was too small.

Kunhardt mentions the extraordinary sailing speed of some sharpies, as does certain correspondence in _Forest and Stream_. A large sharpie was reported to have run 11 nautical miles in 34 minutes, and a big sharpie schooner is said to have averaged 16 knots in 3 consecutive hours of sailing. Tonging sharpies with racing rigs were said to have sailed in smooth water at speeds of 15 and 16 knots. Although such reports may be exaggerations, there is no doubt that sharpies of the New Haven type were among the fastest of American sailing fishing boats.

Sharpie builders in New Haven very early developed a "production" method. In the initial stages of building, the hull was upside down. First, the sides were assembled and the planking and frames secured; then the inner stem was built, and the sides nailed to it, after which the bulkhead and a few rough temporary molds were made and put in place and the boat's sides bent to the desired curve in plain view. For bending the sides a "Spanish windlass" of rope or chain was used. The chine pieces were inserted in notches in the molds inside the side planking and fastened, then the keelson was made and placed in notches in the molds and bulkhead along the centerline. Next, the upper and lower stern frames were made and secured, and the stern staved vertically. Plank extensions of the keelson were fitted, the bottom laid, and the boat turned over. Sometimes the case was made and fitted with the keelson structure, but sometimes this was not done until the deck and inboard works were finished.

The son of Lester Rowe, a noted sharpie builder at New Haven, told me, in 1925, that it was not uncommon for his father and two helpers to build a sharpie, hull and spars, in 6 working days, and that one year his father and two helpers built 31 sharpies. This was at a time after power saws and planers had come into use, and the heavy cutting and finishing of timber was done at a mill, from patterns.

In spite of Barnegat Bay's extensive oyster beds and its proximity to New Haven, the sharpie never became popular in that region, where a small sailing scow known as the "garvey" was already in favor. The garvey was punt-shaped, with its bow narrower than the stern; it had a sledlike profile with moderately flaring sides and a half-deck; and it was rigged with two spritsails, each with a moderate peak to the head and the usual diagonal sprit.[9] The garvey was as fast and as well suited to oyster tonging as the sharpie, if not so handsome; also, it had an economic advantage over the New Haven boat because it was a little cheaper to build and could carry the same load on shorter length. Probably it was the garvey's relative unattractiveness and the fact that it was a "scow" that prevented it from competing with the sharpie in areas outside of New Jersey.

[9] The foremast of the garvey was the taller and carried the larger sail. At one time garveys had leeboards, but by 1850 they commonly had centerboards and either a skeg aft with a rudder outboard or an iron-stocked rudder, with the stock passing through the stern overhang just foreward of the raking transom. The garvey was commonly 24 to 26 feet long with a beam on deck of 6 feet 4 inches to 6 feet 6 inches and a bottom of 5 feet to 5 feet 3 inches.

The Chesapeake Bay Sharpie

The sharpie appeared on the Chesapeake Bay in the early 1870's, but she did not retain her New Haven characteristics very long. Prior to her appearance on the Bay, the oyster fishery there had used several boats, of which the log canoe appears to have been the most popular. Some flat-bottomed skiffs had also been used for tonging. There is a tradition that sometime in the early 1870's a New Haven sharpie named _Frolic_ was found adrift on the Bay near Tangier Island. Some copies of the _Frolic_ were made locally, and modifications were added later. This tradition is supported by certain circumstantial evidence.

Until 20 years ago Tangier Island skiffs certainly resembled the sharpie above the waterline, being long, rather narrow, straight-stem, round-stern, two-masted craft, although their bottoms were V-shaped rather than flat. The large number of boat types suitable for oyster fishery on the Bay probably prevented the adoption of the New Haven sharpie in a recognizable form. After the Civil War, however, a large sailing skiff did become popular in many parts of the Chesapeake. Boats of this type had a square stern, a curved stem in profile, a strong flare, a flat bottom, a sharply raking transom, and a center board of the "daggerboard" form. They were rigged with two leg-of-mutton sails. Sprits were used instead of booms, and there was sometimes a short bowsprit, carrying a jib. The rudder was outboard on a skeg. These skiffs ranged in length from about 18 feet to 28 feet. Those in the 24-to 28-foot range were half-decked; the smaller ones were entirely open.

In the late 1880's or early 1890's the V-bottomed hull became extremely popular on the Chesapeake, replacing the flat-bottom almost entirely, as at Tangier Island. Hence, very few flat-bottomed boats or their remains survive, although a few 18-foot skiffs are still in use.

Characteristics of the large flat-bottomed Chesapeake Bay skiff are shown in figure 4. While it is possible that the narrow beam of this skiff, the straightness of both ends of its bottom camber, and its rig show some New Haven sharpie influence, these characteristics are so similar to those of the flatiron skiff that it is doubtful that many of the Bay sharpies had any real relation to the New Haven boats. As indicated by figures 5 and 7, the Chesapeake flat-bottoms constituted a distinct type of skiff. Except for those skiffs used in the Tangier Island area, it is not evident that the Bay skiffs were influenced by the New Haven sharpie to any great degree, in form at least.

Schooner-rigged sharpies developed on Long Island Sound as early as 1870, and their hulls were only slightly modified versions of the New Haven hull in basic design and construction. These boats were, however, larger than New Haven sharpies, and a few were employed as oyster dredges. After a time it was found that sharpie construction proved weak in boats much over 50 feet. However, strong sharpie hulls of great length eventually were produced by edge-fastening the sides and by using more tie rods than were required by a smaller sharpie. Transverse tie rods set up with turnbuckles were first used on the New Haven sharpie, and they were retained on boats that were patterned after her in other areas. Because of this influence, such tie rods finally appeared on the large V-bottomed sailing craft on Chesapeake Bay.

The sharpie schooner seems to have been more popular on the Chesapeake Bay than on Long Island Sound. The rig alone appealed to Bay sailors, who were experienced with schooners. Of all the flat-bottomed skiffs employed on the Bay, only the schooner can be said to have retained much of the appearance of the Connecticut sharpies. Bay sharpie schooners often were fitted with wells and used as terrapin smacks (fig. 7). As a schooner, the sharpie was relatively small, usually being about 30 to 38 feet over-all.

Since the 1880's the magazine _Forest and Stream_ and, later, magazines such as _Outing_, _Rudder_, and _Yachting_ have been the media by which ideas concerning all kinds of watercraft from pleasure boats to work boats have been transmitted. By studying such periodicals, Chesapeake Bay boatbuilders managed to keep abreast of the progress in boat design being made in new yachts. In fact, it may have been because of articles in these publications that the daggerboard came to replace the pivoted centerboard in Chesapeake Bay skiffs and that the whole V-bottom design became popular so rapidly in the Bay area.

The North Carolina Sharpie

In the 1870's the heavily populated oyster beds of the North Carolina Sounds began to be exploited. Following the Civil War that region had become a depressed area with little boatbuilding industry. The small boat predominating in the area was a modified yawl that had sprits for mainsail and topsail, a jib set up to the stem head, a centerboard, and waterways along the sides. This type of craft, known as the "Albemarle Sound boat" or "Croatan boat," had been developed in the vicinity of Roanoke Island for the local shad fishery. Although it was seaworthy and fast under sail, this boat was not particularly well suited for the oyster fishery because of its high freeboard and lack of working deck for tonging.

Because the oyster grounds in the Carolina Sounds were some distance from the market ports, boats larger than the standard 34-to 36-foot New Haven sharpie were desirable; and by 1881 the Carolina Sounds sharpie had begun to develop characteristics of its own. These large sharpies could be decked and, when necessary, fitted with a cabin. In all other respects the North Carolina sharpie closely resembled the New Haven boat. Some of the Carolina boats were square-sterned, but, as at New Haven, the round stern apparently was more popular.

Most Carolina sharpies were from 40 to 45 feet long. Some had a cramped forecastle under the foredeck, others had a cuddy or trunk cabin aft, and a few had trunk cabins forward and aft. Figure 6 is a drawing of a rigged model that was built to test the design before the construction of a full-sized boat was attempted.[10] The 1884 North Carolina sharpie shown in this plan has two small cuddies; it also has the U-shaped main hatch typical of the Carolina sharpie. It appears that the clubs shown at the ends of the sprits were very often used on the Carolina sharpies, but they were rarely used on the New Haven tongers except when the craft were rigged for racing. The Carolina Sounds sharpie shown under sail in figure 8 is from 42 to 45 feet long and has no cuddy.

[10] In building shoal draft sailing vessels, this practice was usually possible and often proved helpful. In the National Watercraft Collection at the United States National Museum there is a rigged model of a Piscataqua gundalow that was built for testing under sail before construction of the full-scale vessel.

The Carolina Sounds sharpies retained the excellent sailing qualities of the New Haven type and were well finished. The two-sail, two-mast New Haven rig was popular with tongers, but the schooner-rigged sharpie that soon developed (figs. 9, 11-18) was preferred for dredging. It was thought that a schooner rig allowed more adjustment of sail area and thus would give better handling of the boat under all weather conditions. This was important because oyster dredging could be carried on in rough weather when tonging would be impractical. Like the Maryland terrapin smack, the Carolina sharpie schooner adhered closely to New Haven principles of design and construction. However, Carolina sharpie schooners were larger than terrapin smacks, having an over-all length of from 40 to 52 feet. These schooners remained in use well into the 20th century and, in fact, did not go out of use entirely until about 1938. In the 1920's and 1930's many such boats were converted to yachts. They were fast under sail and very stiff, and with auxiliary engines they were equally as fast and required a relatively small amount of power. Large Carolina sharpie schooners often made long coasting voyages, such as between New York and the West Indies.

Sharpies in Other Areas

The Carolina Sounds area was the last place in which the sharpie was extensively employed. However, in 1876 the sharpie was introduced into Florida by the late R. M. Munroe when he took to Biscayne Bay a sharpie yacht that had been built for him by Brown of Tottenville, Staten Island. Afterwards various types of modified sharpies were introduced in Florida. On the Gulf Coast at Tampa two-masted sharpies and sharpie schooners were used to carry fish to market, but they had only very faint resemblance to the original New Haven boat.

The sharpie also appeared in the Great Lakes area, but here its development seems to have been entirely independent of the New Haven type. It is possible that the Great Lakes sharpie devolved from the common flatiron skiff.

The sharpie yacht was introduced on Lake Champlain in the late 1870's by Rev. W. H. H. Murray, who wrote for _Forest and Stream_ under the pen name of "Adirondack Murray." The hull of the Champlain sharpie retained most of the characteristics of the New Haven hull, but the Champlain boats were fitted with a wide variety of rigs, some highly experimental. A few commercial sharpies were built at Burlington, Vermont, for hauling produce on the lake, but most of the sharpies built there were yachts.

Double-Ended Sharpies

The use of the principles of flatiron skiff design in sharp-stern, or "double-ended," boats has been common. On the Chesapeake Bay a number of small, double-ended sailing skiffs, usually fitted with a centerboard and a single leg-of-mutton sail, were in use in the 1880's. It is doubtful, however, that these skiffs had any real relationship to the New Haven sharpie. They may have developed from the "three-plank" canoe[11] used on the Bay in colonial times.

[11] A primitive craft made of three wide planks, one of which formed the entire bottom.

The "cabin skiff," a double-ended, half-decked, trunk-cabin boat with a long head and a cuddy forward, was also in use on the Bay in the 1880's. This boat, which was rigged like a bugeye, had a bottom of planks that were over 3 inches thick, laid fore-and-aft, and edge-bolted. The entire bottom was made on two blocks or "sleepers" placed near the ends. The sides were bevelled, and heavy stones were placed amidships to give a slight fore-and-aft camber to the bottom. The sides, washboards, and end decks were then built, the stones removed, and the centerboard case fitted. In spite of its slightly cambered flat bottom, this boat, though truly a flatiron skiff in midsection form, had no real relation to the New Haven sharpie; it probably owed its origin to the Chesapeake log canoe, for which it was an inexpensive substitute.

R. M. Munroe built double-ended sharpies in Florida, and one of these was used to carry mail between Biscayne Bay and Palm Beach. Although Munroe's double-enders were certainly related to the New Haven sharpie, they were markedly modified and almost all were yachts.

A schooner-rigged, double-ended sharpie was used in the vicinity of San Juan Island, Washington, in the 1880's, but since the heels of the stem and stern posts were immersed it is very doubtful that this sharpie was related in any way to the New Haven boats.

Modern Sharpie Development

The story of the New Haven sharpie presents an interesting case in the history of the development of small commercial boats in America. As has been shown, the New Haven sharpie took only about 40 years to reach a very efficient stage of development as a fishing sailboat. It was economical to build, well suited to its work, a fast sailer, and attractive in appearance.

When sailing vessels ceased to be used by the fishing industry, the sharpie was almost forgotten, but some slight evidence of its influence on construction remains. For instance, transverse tie rods are used in the large Chesapeake Bay "skipjacks," and Chesapeake motorboats still have round, vertically staved sterns, as do the "Hatteras boats" used on the Carolina Sounds. But the sharpie hull form has now almost completely disappeared in both areas, except in a few surviving flat-bottomed sailing skiffs.

Recently the flat-bottomed hull has come into use in small, outboard-powered commercial fishing skiffs, but, unfortunately, these boats usually are modeled after the primitive flatiron skiff and are short in length.

The New Haven sharpie proved that a long, narrow hull is most efficient in a flat-bottomed boat, but no utilization has yet been made of its design as the basis for the design of a modern fishing launch.

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1961

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Washington 25, D.C. Price 25 cents

Transcriber's note:

Printer's errors have been corrected, all other inconsistencies are as in the original. The author's spelling has been maintained.