I plan to add some history links to this page. This is just to show pix. More later. There is so much to say about the skiffs and I’m still trying to find a website that does skiff history justice.
My family donated the Augusta Mann to the Antique Boat Museum in Clayton
Generations of my family members had summer houses on the islands around Lindley Bay at the head of Grindstone. During my childhood I had spent entire summers on Whiskey Island. In the 1970s some of my cousins noticed we had a 22″ St Lawrence Skiff in the rafters of our boathouses. I was involved with the resurrecting of the Augusta Mann when I was a teenager. Our parents got on board with our enthusiasm for taking these boats down and checking them out. Ours had been used for storage in the Whiskey Boathouse for a long time. Mouse nests, rotting sails, antique life preservers, you name it. The skiff had an ancient coat of varnish, very dark and cracked. It was amazing to see her in the water once we realized she wasn’t going to sink, as most predicted. All the islands had 17-18 foot skiffs that were well used. People sailed, rowed, and played “sail tag” in Lindley Bay, a form of tag where teams of 2 people sailed around the bay with one boat being “it”. if they hit your sail with a tennis ball you were “it”. Neighbors waited with numerous motor boats around the outside of the bay, ready to tow the many teams who tipped over to the nearest dock to be righted and bailed out so they could again join the fray. I still shiver at the thought of the beatings these hard to steer antique boats took for the sake of sport!
All our 3 skiffs had centerboards to help with steering when sailing. There were no rudders. You steered by moving back and forth in the skiff to go into or away from the wind. You went all the way to the front of the skiff, pulling up the centerboard on your way forward to come about. The long oars and sleek shape of the skiffs made for heavenly rowing.
My parents donated the Augusta Mann to the Antique Boat Museum in the 1980s. my brother David had had a mental health crisis and had taken a hand saw to her in a fit of rage, hacking and hacking at her until there were many gashes. Milton Carnegie, a Grindstone Island skiff builder, took her home for the winter to rehab her, but told us that this would be her last rehab since he had had to sand down the planking until it was very thin to remove the gashes. This was his last rehab job on a skiff since he was getting on in years. The Augusta Mann would be safe and well cared for at the Museum.
These pictures are of the Augusta Mann on display at the Boldt Castle Boathouse near Alexandria Bay, used by the Museum as a satellite display area. My daughter and I visited and took these pix in 2016.