After more than a decade of wrangling which threatened to see the historic tall ship the Shenandoah removed from Vineyard Haven harbor, the ship’s owners and the Steamship Authority have reached an agreement which will allow the vessel to stay.
In deference to concerns held by SSA captains that the old ship presented a collision hazard to ferry operations, the owners, Black Dog Tall Ships, have agreed to move Shenandoah’s mooring within the harbor, to which it has added picturesque maritime charm since 1964.
Shenandoah, the graceful 108-foot topsail schooner that has long been a landmark in the Vineyard Haven harbor, is laid up at a Fairhaven shipyard, her majestic hull stripped bare and her ribs exposed as she undergoes extensive work to reverse a botched restoration job performed by a shipyard in Maine last year.
Robert Douglas, who is both captain and owner of the Shenandoah, has sued the Boothbay Harbor Shipyard for the apparently shoddy work that left his schooner taking on seawater last summer while she was filled with school children.
Since 1964, the tall ship Shenandoah has brought picturesque maritime charm to Vineyard Haven, moored in the same place in the harbor. But maybe not for much longer.
The Army Corps of Engineers has written to the owners of the 150-foot wooden sloop, the Douglas family, threatening to suspend the permit for the ship to moor there unless they can come up with some solution that resolves persistent complaints from the Steamship Authority that the Shenandoah is a hazard to ferry operations.
A thoroughly refurbished schooner Shenandoah was relaunched Saturday morning at Boothbay Harbor in Maine.
The Shenandoah, one of the Black Dog tall ships that sail from Vineyard Haven harbor, had undergone about six months of extensive rebuilding at the Boothbay Harbor Shipyard.
“We essentially did what is referred to as retopping — a rebuilding of the vessel from the waterline up,” said Bob Foster, a spokesman for the shipyard.
It's said that her name is Indian by origin and means Daughter of the Stars, but in truth she is more like the daughter of Capt. Robert S. Douglas. He planned for her, he provided everything she ever needed, and in return, she has never gone anywhere without him.
Down to the Sea with Love: They Come to the Island for a Memorable Voyage
By JOHN BUDRIS and JAMES D'AMBROSIO
For three magic days they were not heart transplant patients or the leukemia kids in the next ward. They were neither stuck with needles, nor looped through high-tech machines.
For three magic days their parents forgot about blood counts, organ rejection and the next visit to yet another specialist at Boston Children's Hospital.