ClipperFan
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Rick, From the few online images I've seen of the spectacular Flying Cloud miniature, especially in reference to her gorgeous sail plan, this Boucher model is definitely worth seeing in person. Having said that, it's still inaccurate to the Boston Daily Atlas contemporary description, as well as several contemporary art depictions. Her lovely trumpet bearing winged angel figurehead is merely tacked on below the bowsprit. There's no naval hoods or gilded carved arch cutwater. Meanwhile a small portico protecting the entrance to rear cabins below is a substantial building on the model. Eventually I intend to make sketches correcting these oversights and share them on a separate page. As for the two artists, it's quite possible that both were able to view Flying Fish in person. The similarity of portrayals is just too much for coincidence. It's also a good possibility that in a refit, a single stick mizzen was replaced with a built mast after discovering sticks weren't strong enough.- 602 replies
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Rob, Addition of those rope coils to the belaying points is an ultimate touch of miniature realism. When she's complete, your Glory of the Seas Clipper Ship with such devout attention to detail will blow people away.
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Rob, For Vladimir's sake, I really hope you're keeping meticulous records of your impressive rigging scheme. It's nothing short of amazing!
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Hi Rob, I hear you about that distracting phenomenon. I recall having similar challenges with much smaller sailing ships. They had woefully inadequate, painfully simplistic rigging instructions, just your very basic standing, running rigging with preformed rubberlike ratlines. So we innovated quite a lot to approach as much realism possible. I remember making teenie blocks of knotted black thread. At the scale they were, these were quite realistic. In our case we simply worked from inside out and fore to aft from lowest to highest yards. I have no clue how you're designing your lines but I recall that by staying consistent, things seemed to flow better. Of course, you already built and fully rigged the King of Donald McKay's Clipper Ships with your scratch built masterpiece, the Great Republic. So I'm very confident, you got this.
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Rob, As the complex rigging of your miniature becomes ever more complete, it strikes me how critically important it would have been on these massive sailing vessels to be sure none of the lines get tangled up with any others, or there must have been hell to pay! I constantly find myself running out of superlatives to describe your progress. Impressive, most impressive!
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Rob, Thanks for the encouraging words. My placement of the bit matches exactly that of Mike's, which I figured matched the exact end of the inner end of the bowsprit. My other concern is placement of the capstan. There was no specifics of that location, so mine matches the side view placement of my large sketch. If you have exact dimensions for that device, I can reposition it in both sketches.
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George, I meant no insult to the legendary Tea Clipper Cutty Sark and for that disparagement, unintentional as it was on behalf of the Bonnie Scottish Lass, I apologize. After all, Cutty Sark herself is a most successful survivor whilst poor old Glory of the Seas was burnt to cinders. My point was the lost design uniqueness of McKay's Clippers, which has been buried for well over a century is finally coming to light.
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Rob and Rick, No surprise, I agree completely with Rob's conclusion. I write this, not to hijack your Flying Fish posts but to reinforce the importance for yours and all future Flying Fish builds, even to get all future McKay Clipper models constructed accurately. This unveiling of a universal nautical feature of all Donald McKay Clippers hasn't occured possibly since the launch of Flying Cloud in the Spring of 1851! In fact, I have not even seen one accurate example of Flying Cloud herself. None has ever been built, including a two-thirds scale version of her docked in East Boston in the '70s. That beautiful Clipper was constructed by the same skilled Lunenberg, Nova Scotian ship builders who constructed the 1963 HMS Bounty! In a way, it's a back handed slap, a tribute to McKay's jealous protection of his savvy marine ideas. Perhaps, posthumously his spirit's finally decided to set the record straight. Even though, for those who can read and view images with discrimination, these have been somewhat open secrets.... "This magnificent ship has been the wonder of all who have seen her. Not only is she the largest of her class afloat, but her model may be said to be the original of a new idea in naval architecture." The New Clipper Stag Hound, Boston Daily Atlas, December 21, 1850 (italics added for emphasis) There's a "blink and you'll miss it" reference to the bow construction of this revolutionary new Donald McKay Extreme Clipper Ship. Here's all the author says on the subject. In fact, it's actually a single, almost toss off sentence: "An idea of its sharpness may be formed from the fact that, at the load displacement line (as the cutwater is tapered to an angle) a flat surface applied to the bow from its extreme, would show no angle at the hood ends." (again italics added for emphasis). In fact, Duncan MacLean never uses the term naval hoods until his more in-depth description of McKay's second Extreme Clipper Flying Cloud. That's where he makes his critical observation of the incredible strength of such a brilliant construct. To get an idea of this built in ruggedness, take a look at the relative open, near frailness of the Tea Clipper Cutty Sark. So, is it any surprise to see this very same marine architecture utilized by Donald McKay in his self-funded, desperate last build to save his shipyard and very livelihood? Think about it, McKay literally spared no expense, employing the very best materials in building his Glory of the Seas. It's noteworthy that his reliable stem, protected by cutwater surmounted by naval hoods are all there to the end.
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Rick, With Mike's encouragement, I've already prepared a 30+ page in-depth article to be submitted before July 1st to the Nautical Research Journal. It's very image heavy but not because they're extraneous. The pictures included are actually integral to the topics discussed. Since Mike has told me he really enjoyed reading it, I'm confident it will be published. Earliest would be their Winter issue, probably this December. After that, I plan on starting my own topic in research. It will be on the topic of finally realizing authentic looks of Donald McKay's Clippers.
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Rob, Nice pic of one of Donald McKay's fastest Clipper Ships. She was very close in size to Glory of the Seas too.
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Rob, Here's where I'm at with Glory's revised 8.3 degree stem below the waterline. I have to admit that this appears to be much closer to the one scene we have of her in the Spokane Grain Co. dock which shows her somewhat aggressive prow. Both illustrations are to the same 1:96th scale per Mike's request.
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Rob and Vladimir, Please post direct bird's-eye views of your Glory of the Seas forecastle to the front two-thirds of her great house. Here's my conjectural sketch, incorporating Vladimir's two red lines revising Mike's 1992 deck view from his general arrangement. Before sending it to Mike, I want to verify the accuracy of my interpretation.
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Druxey, Considering that her hull was 53 years old by this point, I'm amazed the owners, not to mention dismantling crew, felt sanguine enough to carve so many large holes in her upper superstructure! You would think that they would have been concerned that such reckless activity might cause her to buckle and sink. Remember, she still had all that weighty factory refrigerator processing equipment aboard too. Since obviously that didn't happen, it's a real tribute to the long lasting durability of her design, materials and construction. This also makes me wonder, what if? What if those Boston magnates who held the final fate of Glory of the Seas in their hands had decided "let's go for it!" Let's take on the challenge and tow her home to be restored in Boston! If she makes it, we've saved Donald McKay's last Clipper. If she doesn't, then the seas have taken her to her final grave".... Had they given poor, old faithful Glory her final chance to survive, I for one firmly belive she would have made it.
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Rob, I can't imagine any museum not being truly excited to put your fabulous model on display. I can see her posed direcly in front of that 1877 reference picture you have of Glory docked in San Francisco. Better yet, maybe she can become a traveling exhibit, going from museum to museum. That way, I might finally get to see her in person myself!
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Rob, Part of the oversight is the fact that a lot of American ship modeling seems to have descended from Popular Mechanics style do-it-yourself articles geared towards a general population looking to create an impressive mantle piece object. Topics such as figureheads were as inaccurate as to describe options, such as a fiddlehead or mermaid decoration for McKay's Clipper Sovereign of the Seas! Personally, I owe a great debt of gratitude to Lars Bruzelius. His website is where I have found dozens of great, highly specific documentation of many popular McKay vessels, including lesser known Clippers as Santa Claus, Bald Eagle and Mastiff amongst others. That's where I first learned of such critical nautical devices as naval hoods and cutwaters, which completely alter the appearance of a McKay Clipper bow.
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"Her hood ends are bolted alternately from either side, through each other and the stem, so that the loss of her cutwater wouldn't affect her safety or cause a leak." This quote is verbatim from Duncan MacLean's, April 25, 1851 Boston Daily Atlas article with its' usual lengthy description of McKay's most famous Extreme Clipper Flying Cloud. Why is this relevant to your build of the Flying Fish? Because such a successful robust nautical design component, which originated with McKay's inaugural Extreme Clipper Stag Hound wouldn't have been abandoned lightly. However it would have been tightly guarded as a design element by Donald McKay himself. If you harbor any doubts, just look at McKay's Clipper Lightning. Reproductions of her prow mysteriously end in a blank space. This may almost sound heretical but I'm convinced that until the exhaustive, methodical research done on Glory of the Seas uncovered a photographically accurate McKay bow, none of the models of McKay Clippers have been accurate. That includes the spectacular 1930s large Boucher model of Flying Cloud. That's due to none including naval hoods or cutwaters. They all leave just a bare stem, tacking on the figurehead underneath the bowsprit almost as an aforethought. Which is exactly how your Flying Fish model plans appear too. As a visual aid, I've attached a close up image of the bow of Glory. Naval Hoods are the large curving devices just over her figurehead, cutwaters are the ornately carved arch mounted just below her figurehead. The stem is hidden by the cutwater. I've done some proper reconstructions of the real appearance of your clipper, including a more lifelike flying fish figurehead. You can decide how much, if any you want to incorporate
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Rob, Sadly America has never seemed to put much value to what we now consider priceless items. Consider the abysmal fate of the historic Yacht America. Launched in the 1850s, after setting the mark to win the 100 Guineas Cup, which has forever now been known as the America's Cup, she survived being a Confederate Blockade Runner as well as a Union Blockade enforcer during the Civil War. While the US Navy had ultimately planned to restore her, they left her poorly protected. As a result, a damn snowstorm collapsed the shed she was resting in and she became a total loss in the 1940s, when she was 90 years old. This disgraceful history of benign neglect continues to thi day. Back in the 60s, I used to love to watch Hawaii 5-0. Not only did it feature one of my favorite Montague Dawson works of art The Ariel and Taeping very often a wonderful fully restored 4 masted sailing ship the Falls of Clyde featured as a constant backdrop. Fast forward to today and that same magnificent steel ship is so neglected, she's in danger of sinking...
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Rick, Believe it or not, I'm actually relieved to hear you say that. I often feel like it's a thin line to walk between offering historically accurate discoveries and insulting the work of others. My consistent goal is to be an aid in reproducing Clipper Ships, especially those of Donald McKay's as closely to the original as possible. Thanks for the compliment.
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Rob, Mike has come through for us yet again. Per your specific request, here's the image of Glory of the Seas being dismantled in 1922. Mike scans these amazing images and attaches them as e-mails. They arrive with some white space surrounding the image. To maximize the image, white space has been cropped out and the image has been rotated for better viewing. The picture itself is left entirely intact.
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Rick, actually I'm reversing my position. Two out of three of Duncan Maclean's McKay Clipper ship's are specifically referenced as having fished fore and main masts. Stag Hound his first and Flying Fish both omit any mention of a fished mizzen mast. In all cases I read, the mizzen masts were smaller in diameter than their inner bowsprit. This leads me to conclude that it's very likely the mizzens were solid sticks and not built, like I was first convinced they were.
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Rick, you're welcome. I'm constantly in awe of the talent, vision and persistency you ship modelers display in these builds. Having such rare images of an actual McKay Clipper as a reference is a big help in clarifying issues like the configuration of rear coach houses. Since there's no specific mention for dimensions of that particular structure, I would leave 4' on both sides as catwalks. Being a larger ship, Glory of the Seas had 5' catwalks. Also, her rear companion was offset to her port side, not centered like the Flying Fish plans depict, which is also entirely conjectural. There's another photo of the McKay vessel Sovereign of the Seas. Her rear coach house companion is also offset to her port side.
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George, Every time Glory of the Seas had solid lower masts, there were no iron hoops. Out of curiosity, I looked at the recently restored Whale Bark Charles W Morgan. She had all three solid lower masts, again no hoops. There apparently is no enginerring structural need of iron bands on solid masts. Despite the conflicting paintings, from Duncan MacLean's usually reliable description, it appears that Flying Fish at least as originally launched, had a solid mizzen mast.
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George, the last thing I'd want is for you to damage any portion of your model while trying to improve scale accuracy. Looking at how large Glory's lubbers holes are leads me to believe part of the top frames must have been metal to reinforce strength.
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Rick, Thanks for sharing your beautiful construction techniques. I really appreciate seeing the steps illustrated so methodically. I'm actually using pictures of your completed forecastle as a visual aid in revising our Glory of the Seas deck arrangement. Meanwhile I've shared a rare stern image of her so that you can see how the rear coach house section actually curves matching the outer contours of her hull. This allows her catwalks on both sides to remain consistent from bow to sterncm for the working of the ship.
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George, from the many images of Glory I've seen, it appears like these are her original tops. Here's another scene of her in dry dock from a lower starboard bow view. The lubbers holes are more visible in this one. As for the mizzen mast of Flying Fish, I reread the publicist's description and you're right. Only fore and main are described as being fished. Not only that but according to specs included, her mizzen was only 26 1/2" in diameter, slimmer than her 18' 28" bowsprit. Finally, I've included a rare stern scene of Glory docked in Alaska. The large rear coach house actually curves gracefully to accomodate dual catwalks which surround both sides. I estimated they're 5' wide and stay consistent from front to rear of the house. Since your foundation appears to be the sole part of your particular coach house, I felt you might appreciate knowing the actual configuration of this section of McKay's vessels.
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