Evening star., 1940-02-18
Rich With Adventures
Of Sea, Craft Would
Be Monument
1,755,000 Hove Visited
Romantic Symbol Of
Vanished Industry
BY TOM HORGAN.

BY TOM HORGAN.
Associated Press Sports Writer.
NEW BEDFORD, Mass, Feb. IT.
Capn Sykes, sez I, thar she blows
and braches and white waters, and
eparm at that! Shall lowr?
Mr.. Sims, sez he, don't see fitten
tew low'r (and the wind she blew a
livin' gale), but if so be you wishes
tew low'r on your own RESPONSE
bil-i-tee, then low'r and be good
gosh darned!
It's a good many years now since
anything like the colloquy between
the tabled Capn Sykes and his re-
doubtable mate has been heard
aboard the Charles w. Morgan, last
New England whaler, and it is to be
feared the captain said something
more pungent than gosh darned"
when Mr.. Sims took responsibility
for dropping a boat oversize and
successfully pursuing a Leviathan
of the deep.
That doughty pair belonged to
roaring, rum-drinking past.
Today group of prominent
yachtsmen opened a campaign for
funds to enshrine New England's last
whaler as tangible record of days
when men lived by the code-"A
dead whale or a stove boat"
Many years have passed since the
last black plume rose from the
Charles w. Morgan's try works and
her decks ran slippery with oil as
she pursued greasy luck" across
all the oceans of the globe. But
within her stout planks is concen-
trated all the glamour of an adven-
turous but vanished industry.
Holmes Poem Saved Constitution.
There countless farm boys knew
She pangs of first seasickness, there
brooded dusky gay head Indians,
best of harpooners; coopers who bar
relied the harvest, blacksmiths who
mended and Strengthened the arms
of a dangerous trade-lances and
harpoons no stronger than the men
who welded them.
The Morgan remains a symbol OF
all that, and more, too, and that
Us why the yachtsmen have come to
her aid-that she may be kept as
Gealously as the frigate Consti-
tuition, or Nelson's flagship Victory,
|or the yacht America, first winner
|of the most coveted sailing trophy.
(which bears her name.
Oliver Wendell Holmes once saved
|the Constitution with a poem
'Aye, tear her tattered ensign
The yachtsmen propose to do it
with hard cash and that mission
has brought together two noted
hivals in the defense of the Amer
|ica's Cup, Harold S. Vanderbilt and
|Oharles Francis Adams, former
Navy Secretary.
Visited by 1,775,000.
Yacht clubs all along the New
England seaboard are represented
bin a drive for funds to repair the
|old whaler and move her from the
nearby estate of the late Col.
|E. H. r. Green to Marine Park
Frederic A. Delano, President
|Roosevelt's uncles is a member of
the committee.
Green, who had preserved the
Morgan during his later years,
made no provision for her In his
will and the elements have taken a
toll since his death in 1886. The
1888 hurricane damaged her stern,
but ship carpenters say this easily
can be repaired before she is
towed to the park. During her Is
years at the Green Estate, 1,775, 900
visitors, nearly three-fourths from
outside Massachusetts,, have in
|spected the Morgan.
Launched in 1841, the Morgan
was a particularly fortunate vessel.
Her first voyage, of more than
three years, put $65,0O0 in the
|cohers of her owners. Stately
mansions here and on the Islands
LOT Nantucket and Marthas Vine
yard testify to profits of the in
dustry. They were built by canny
New England and Quaker sailing
masters and ship owners; not by
Ordinary members of the crew, who
frequently returned from long
voyages owing the ship for cloth
ing and supplies.
Voyages of several years duration
were common when blubber hunt
ing was in its heyday. They tell in
New Bedford of a skipper, about to
sail, who lost patience with his wife
because she wept over his failure to
say good bye.
"Hmph!" he snorted. Were
making short voyage-only be gone
about a year."
Morgan a Lucky Craft.
The Morgan enjoyed many profit
able years before kerosene lighted
the worlds lamps and steel sup
planted whalebone in molding wasp
waists. Like others of her calling,
numbering TAO sail in 1847, she
pursued the uncharted track that
led to undiscovered tropic isles and
the polar wastes.
She escaped the fate of many of
the fleet, which were laden with
stone and sunk at the entrances of
Savannah and Charleston harbors
to bar blocade runners during the
Civil War. The Confederate cruiser
shenandoah destroyed 46 others.
Storm and typhoon whistled
through her rigging, but she lived
on. In 1871, 80 whalers were crushed
by the Arctic ice and, five years later,
10 others met similar fate, but the
Morgan was In happier waters.
The Morgan last was fitted out In
1915, to hunt the sea elephant in the
Indian OCEAN. She also had a few
motion picture assignments, but her
active days ended in 1921. when she
came home to New Bedford.
roI..aI Tan~ Roxne