Building Traditions: Family Fun Day Weathers the Snow at the Essex Shipbuilding Museum

By Amanda C. Thompson

Photos by Muriel Hoffacker

Gordon College News Service

February 16, 2010
(This article appeared in The Gloucester Times on February 17.)

The art of shipbuilding has been a tradition in Essex since shortly after the pilgrims settled in. So it wasn’t exactly a surprise when over 30 Cape Ann residents braved the snow for the Essex Shipbuilding Museum and Wellspring House’s Family Fun Day on Tuesday, February 16.

“Our forefathers built ships and went fishing in the snow,” said Barbara Johnson Low, head of the museum’s education and group tours departments. “We can, too.”

Along with their neighbors in Gloucester who bought and sailed the boats, some of the first residents of Essex helped build the fishing industry in America. On Tuesday, contemporary families came together to learn, hands-on, about the craft and the traditions in the free special event co-sponsored by the Museum and Wellspring Cape Ann Families.

“The techniques of wooden shipbuilding haven’t changed since Noah’s ark,” said Justin Demetri, head tour guide for the Museum.

Families learned how to frame the boat, putting ribs on the backbone (or keel). They bent steamed planks around the frame, clamping them in place to be nailed: the “skin” of the boat.

Children and their parents then pounded square pegs through a round hole to make wooden nails called trunnels, which are the best for holding ships together because they never rust. They’re part of the reason seven original Chebacco boats (which is the type of boat traditionally built at the Museum) are still around, two of them over 115 years old. A standard Chebacco boat needs about 7,000 trunnels.

In fact, everything at the Museum is authentic. Harold Burnham, who builds the ships, did his homework on the Chebacco boat, down to the rainbow palette decorating the boat’s body. And he still builds outside, for the same reason he still uses wood: tradition.

“Clamping the planks was the best part,” said Gabe Leibensperger, 10, of Gloucester after a morning of plank bending and trunnel pounding. Conor Williamson, 11, also of Gloucester, thought so too. “But it was hard to get a grip on the clamp wearing those gloves,” he said.

Maisie Grow, 8, helped hold the two-inch-thick plank in place while Williamson and his grandfather clamped it. “It wasn’t that hard,” she said. Perhaps she’s just used to this kind of work, since she and her sisters like to play pirates.

“Events like this create opportunities for family fun,” said Stacy Randell, director of the Wellspring Cape Ann Families support and education center, which has offered free family-oriented events during winter break for over a decade. “That bonding can help with communication and discipline at home.”

Plus, it’s educational. Low said that because it’s interactive, the Museum offers families a glimpse into the lives their ancestors may have lived. Many Cape Ann families, including most present on Tuesday, have shipbuilders and fishers somewhere in their history.

“The Museum is a great place to experience history together as a family,” said Low. “There are a million museums around here, but we’re the most hands-on. You’re out there in the shipyard doing what the shipbuilders do.”