Tag: wooden boat

More excellent video of Grand Banks schooners dory boats and fishermen

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The Lonely Men of the Dories

Jay Cresswell has been in touch to tell us about some more video of the Grand Bankers of Portugal – see Comments in the left-hand column above left.

He’s also been in touch to say that within a few years, there will be as many as three restored four-masted schooners built in the 1930s for use in the Grand Banks fishing grounds.

But to return to the video, the material he has found is marvellous footage of the schooners, their wooden boats and the fishermen themselves – six sections of film titled The Lonely Men of the Dories – the link above goes to section 1, but the rest are linked below. By the way, don’t let the title you see in the Youtube pages worry you – the voiceovers are in English.

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 1

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 2

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 3

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 4

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 5

The Lonely Men of the Dories part 6

Wherry Albion dismasted!

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Norfolk Broads wherry Albion dismasted during the Breydon Wherry Race of 1952

This photo taken by John Hopthrow comes with permission from the Broadland Memories website – and this page in particular, which includes a scene from the beginning of the Breydon Wherry Race of 1952, and another in which Dragon and Hathor run aground while Albion overtakes. It seems that Albion’s luck didn’t hold out on this occasion…

The page also includes a shot of the ‘new’ Barton Turf sign erected around the same time, which I’m glad to say was still there when I last saw it. If you’ve got a soft spot for the Broads, as we have, you’ll love this site.


The White Ship – Portuguese fishing schooner

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Here’s a fabulous piece of film following the crew of a Portuguese schooner fishing off the Grand Banks in the middle of the last century, complete with footage of dories stacked on deck and being rowed and lifted aboard, and the fishermen themselves hauling long lines, gutting fish, getting lost in fog and even attending the funeral of a fellow crew member.

The commentary feels a little over-cooked for our times – whoever wrote it may have been reading a little too much Hemingway – and the screen is a little fuzzy, but what it shows is priceless for anyone with an interest in this aspect of maritime history and the boats involved.

I’m grateful to the excellent Mal Nicholson, owner of the Humber supersloop Spider T (of which more soon!) for letting me know about it.

PS – The really good news is that several of these Grand Bankers are still alive and being renovated and restored by the Portuguese as Jay Creswell tells us in his comment below. Don’t miss what he has to say…