scudding
In 1960 George Sherlock Maynard dropped out of college and went to sea in a submarine. Four years later, suffering from the ongoing strangeness of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) he left the Navy through a psycho ward and took up woodcarving and wooden boatbuilding. By 1973 he had built, with his own hands, a much admired copy of Spray, the 37-foot vessel in which Captain Joshua Slocum became the first man to sail alone around the world (1895-98). Scud was the name George gave his new boat when she was launched in 1972. In the ensuing five years (1973-78), with his wife and three children and dog for crew, he sailed Scud completely around the globe, without the assistance of an auxiliary engine or a big bank account. How this was accomplished, and the underlying, driving forces behind the voyage, are the weft and warp of this interwoven tale. SCUDDING, a work of creative non-fiction, is his first book He has previously published several stories in WoodenBoat magazine: Zulu, WB number 129, April 1996 Salish Star, Zen in a Rowboat, WB number 139, November/December 1997 The Unmodified Crusoe, WB number 142, May/June 1998 Zulu, WB number 150, September/October 1999 A New Lead Keel for a California Schooner, WB number 162, October 2001 A Boatload of Ambition, Building a rowing dory—for a circumnavigation, WB number 176, January/February 2004 Over the years, George has garnered an eclectic education as a bus boy, dishwasher, greens keeper, caddy, cowboy, construction worker, hay stacker, boat builder, slaughterhouse hand, story teller, woodcarver, long-haul truck driver, wheat farmer, sailor, welder, and writer. “Anything I could do to make a living,” he says. “Trading honest, creative work for a living is the real challenge. I can’t imagine the guilt and boredom of having it all given to you; or, worse yet, the shame of stealing bread from the blind. From an early age I loved building things from ideas conjured in my head, and I guess I never graduated beyond that way of making things happen.”