May 2014 MAINE COASTAL NEWS Page 5. Group Looks to Save Kennebunk-built PHYLLIS A. On August 14, 1910, when a fl eet of fi ve
small boats an d 20 young fi shermen led by Albert Arnold left Charlevoix, Michigan, and started their twenty-four-day trek to the East Coast to try their luck, the gill netting industry on the Atlantic coast was born. Gill netting had been attempted in the
Gloucester area for many years, but never quite caught on. These young men, on the recommendation of a gear salesman from Gloucester Net and Twine Company, decid- ed to try it again. The fi sh stocks on the Great Lakes were waning and the call of the salty brine was a tempting venture, so the little boats set off to encounter many adventures including their fi rst experience with the At- lantic tides! When the boats arrived at Cape Cod, the men decided to spend the night ashore for the fi rst time in days. They woke in the morning, to fi nd their vessels 100 feet from shore! They took their ribbing then and did so again in Gloucester when their vessels were tied a little too short at the wharf and left the men with a quite precarious attempt to board at low tide. The locals found that they worked like bears, and so were given the name “The Michigan Bears”. Once they started fishing out of
Gloucester, and bringing home $12 a week, the experiment was considered a success and the women and children were sent for and the dynasty began. The next vessels and families and crews from Charlevoix arrived in Gloucester by freight car. Albert Arnold was skipper of the MIN-
DORA with crewmen Oliver (Cy) Tysver, Herman Tysver and Gerry (Mike) Shoares. The HOPE, WEASEL, PRINCE OLAF and EAGLE, were skippered by Jack Genet, Ed Weiderman, Sam Halberson and John Nordrum. These men and their families made their homes and lived mostly in East Gloucester, near where the PHYLLIS A. is now berthed at the Gloucester Marine Railways on Rocky Neck. These little boats turned into larger boats and bigger crews. Arnold’s next boat was the ANNA T.
which was lost on the Annisquam River bar during a blow. In 1925, Capt. Arnold went to Kennebunkport, Maine, to have Bernie Warner build the PHYLLIS A. which started her 75-year career fi shing from the same port and for the same family, a claim made by no other vessel in Gloucester. PHYLLIS A. is a classic-style Glouces- ter gillnetter from the early 20th
century, like
the ones we remember from our childhoods as the little workhorses of the industry. It was built with a straight stem and lovely round fantail launch-style stern with no transom. Many gillnetters in the industry today started their careers as crew aboard the Phyllis A. When her last skipper and youngest Arnold son, Richard Arnold, retired in 2000, the PHYLLIS A. went to become a museum at the Warner Shipyard next Arundel Wharf in Kennebunkport. By 2006, the Kennebunk River was silting in and the PHYLLIS A. was in danger from touching bottom at low tide, so she was returned to Gloucester to the Phyllis A. Marine Association (PAMA), where she is cared for by a small group of people dedicated to the display and preser- vation of the vessel and promotion of the history of the gillnetting industry. Today, she sits at her berth across Smith
Cove from the old Arnold Wharf, at the Gloucester Marine Railways Corporation. PAMA has been working to raise the mon- ey to restore the vessel to her approximate 1950s working confi guration. The citizens of Gloucester have funded projects for the PHYLLIS A. through the Community Pres- ervation Act to replace planks, stanchions and railings. Work on the stern and aft deck will start soon on the ways at the Gloucester Marine Railways. The next step will be to restore the pilot house and the fo’c’sle. On April 13, 2014, PAMA started a 60-day internet fundraiser through
www.indiego-
go.com. All donations to the PHYLLIS A. Marine Association are tax- deductible. You can learn more about the PHYLLIS A. and the fund raiser at
www.phyllis-a.org.
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E-mail:
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419 Harpswell Islands Road (Rt. 24) Harpswell, Maine 04079 207.729.1639
www.greatislandboatyard.com
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