Wooden ships of a bygone era
Wooden schooners graced coastal Maine for more than a century as vessels of trade and commerce.
The advent of steam-powered craft relegated these elegant four-, five- and six-masted ships to obsolescence, and they vanished from harbors and horizons. The neglected survivors suffered a variety of fates — fires, sinkings, even U-boat attacks. The Carroll A. Deering washed ashore as a ghost ship with no trace of her crew and a pot of pea soup still cooking on the stove.
In “Lost Maine Coastal Schooners: From Glory Days to Ghost Ships” (2010, The History Press, $19.99, paperback, 125 pages) maritime history enthusiast Ingrid Grenon chronicles these magnificent ships and the men who built and sailed them.
Chock full of authentic photographs among the meticulously researched stories, the book serves as a time capsule for those who love Maine and the sea.
This article originally appeared in the January 2012 issue.
