The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1899-05-04
BICYCLING VS.. BOATING
Old Salts of CommunipaW
Say the Wheel Has Hurt
Their Business The
3 Shad Catch.

F&
The old salts along the Commuffipaw
shore are very busy these days. The boat
houses and yacht clubs are scenes of bus
tie and activity. The boating season Is
now nearly due, but the owners OFF boats
will not be caught u~nprepared, judging
from the scenes witnessed yesterday. All
kinds of boats, ranging form row boats
to big sail boats and all sizes of launches.
will v been thoroughly ~overhauled by
the time the much ionged for season ar
rives. A reporter of 'The News" Wis
tied the boat houses and yacht clubs
along the Comrnunipaw shore yesterday
afternoon. To see the activity of boat
owners one would think that the racing
season would be upon them within a
week. There are hundreds of sailboats ~
ing on the shore, all of which will be
thoroughly overhauled and repaired be-
fore they are pushed into New York Bay.
The majority of the boats have to be
scraped and repainted before they are
thought safe enough to use in very deep
water.
1t was not an uncommon sight to see
an old salt, with the TYPICAL beard and
nautical slang, busy plugging up a hole
or eaulking a crack with oakum and
then smearing on a lot OF tar in order to
make the spot doubly secure. Dozens Of
pots of all colors of paints were to be
seen lying about. Brown paint is chiefly
used on the interior of yachts, green on
the bottom n white on the sides.
The Jersey City Yacht Club will be very
much in the swim his season, as before.
The boat house of this popular
club was Quilted little more than a year
ago, but the quarters now used are more
commodious. The damage was enorm-
Gus, all the sails and rigging being de-
stroyed. This almost caused the exclu-
sion of the club from the regatta last
year, but enough boats were repaired in
time.
Decoration Day, the yachting season
will open in real earnest. Although a
schedule has not yet been prepared by
any of the clubs, an exciting season re-
plete with good sport is anticipated.
One of the "smartest boats on the
beach, as an old salt described it, is
that owned by Commodore Roe of the
Jersey City Yacht Club. The boat is
named the Forsythe, and in a slick look
ing craft it is. This boat has defeated
everything, about the C~ommunipaw
shores.
The Theo, owned by Captain Parker,
is another fast boat, which has FREE
quently pushed the Forsythe for first
honors.
The Pavonia Yacht Club is the scene
of much hustle. All of the boats owned
by the members are being overhauled
and put in tip top shape All will be
ready in due time to compete in the
annual races. Many exciting races are
looked for, the first being held on Dec
Grafton Day.
The bicycle, those who frequent the
shores and patronize the boat houses say,
is hurting the boating business consider
ably. Rowboats are not very much in
demand these days. Many boatmen have
been forced to abandon the business of
hiring out rowboats to pleasure parties.
In an interview yesterday with a BOA
owner, a News reporter learned that
the business had fallen off at least one
half. Boats are now being used for
grabbing and fishing parties.
I'VE have about two hundred boats put
away" said the boat owner, but only
about one-half of them will be taken out
of storage, to be repainted and refitted.
At all the lighthouses the owners speak
in the same strain.
1t will probably surprise many readers
of TIE News to learn that from six
hundred to a thousand shad are landed
at C-ommunipaw each day. The hedges
where the nets are placed are just oft
the Statue of Liberty. Dozens of boats
come in each day and the fish are packed
e =. Of -
are,are, too, some weighing fifteen
pounds.