Bruce MacDonald drew stories from his book, Never Say P*G: The Book of Sailors’ Superstitions, sharing the best of sailors’ superstitions. Bruce collected them while he was sailing on the Great Lakes and more than 100,000 nautical miles in many places all over the world. He told the Shellbacks all about this ‘original marine insurance’ and some of the history behind why sailors are so superstitious. About Bruce MacDonald
Bruce resides on the west coast where he captains the full-rigged ship, North Star of Herschel Island. He sailed her extensively for eighteen years while he and his late wife raised four children aboard. Bruce is the author of several books. His latest, Never Say P*g, is a book about sailors’ superstitions. Many of these myths were collected by Bruce while he was sailing on the Great Lakes. Others were learned in his more than 100,000 nautical miles under sail in many places all over the world. He came to tell the Shellback Club about this 'original marine insurance' and some of the history behind why sailors are so superstitious.
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Gordon Laco updated Shellback Club on the story of HMCS Oriole, the sail training vessel of the Royal Canadian Navy based at CFB Halifax in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She is a sailing ketch, currently the oldest commissioned vessel in the Royal Canadian Navy, and also the longest serving commissioned ship. Originally the yacht Oriole IV, the vessel was acquired by the Royal Canadian Navy during the Second World War, then returned to private ownership at the end. Oriole IV was reacquired during the Cold War for use on the East Coast of Canada before switching to the West Coast of Canada in 1956. In 2018, the training vessel returned to the East Coast. About Gord Laco
Gordon Laco served on the Board of Directors of Tall Ships America 2015 to 2021, and currently sits on the Board of Tall Ships Canada. He supports the operations of sail training ships and maintenance of classic yachts in every way he can. He began his career in the marine industry in 1979 after studying history at the University of Western Ontario when he joined the staff of Toronto’s Tom Taylor Company, following in the footsteps of his late uncle, Con Costas. Gord has long-held respect for seamanship and an appreciation for traditional rigging. He began importing gear for sail training and museum ships in 1999 when he was Captain of HMS BEE, the reproduction gunboat schooner operated by the Ontario Government on the Upper Great Lakes. He began distributing rope and rigging across North America on a full-time basis in 2003 after returning from 18 months as Lead Technical Adviser to the production of the feature film ‘Master and Commander, the Far Side of the World’. He has served as historical advisor to over 60 film and television productions, recently working with Tom Hanks on the production of the WW2 drama GREYHOUND. Gord was co-founder of Atlantic Challenge Canada, served as Executive Director of Toronto Brigantine and has sat on the boards of Huronia Museum and Midland Public Library. Even though as a professional mariner he dislikes shipwrecks, he also sits on the board of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society. Gord is a frequent public speaker on issues involving seamanship, nautical history and youth development. He served eleven years as an officer in the Royal Canadian Navy and was, at the time of his commissioning, the oldest person to complete the RCN’s tough Basic Officer’s Training Course. Core to his operations is his company G. H. Laco & Son Ltd, which specializes in traditional gear for ships and yachts. He is proud that his son, Robert, has joined him in the business. When he has time, he races and cruises on the waters of Georgian Bay. This presentation documents Judith, Aubrey, and Aaron's 4200 NM Go Home Passage north from El Salvador to Lake Huron. The trip was complicated by heavy weather, engine breakdowns, a 2 1/2 year delay due to COVID, and a problem-plagued land delivery from northern Mexico to Chicago. However, the 1978 Ontario 32 is now on the hard at the Millard’s home, the North Channel Yacht Club, on the north shore of Lake Huron above Manitoulin Island, The trip marks an end to their retirement odyssey starting in 1998, and ending this fall of 2022. The presentation covers the 2100 mile passage from El Salvador to Mexico, the shipping arrangements for a 2000 mile trip to Chicago, and the 400 mile passage up Lake Michigan to Lake Huron. About Aubrey Millard
Aubrey Millard is a retired Royal Canadian Navy officer and Clearance Diving Officer as well as a retired teacher. He is a Past Commodore of the Toronto Hydroplane and Sailing Club, and currently a member of the North Channel Yacht Club on the north shore of Lake Huron. He has his skipper's and instructor's certificates from the Canadian Yachting Association, and the British Kiel Yacht Club. After awarded the prestigious Bayfield Award with the Great Lakes Cruising Club for sailing over 5,000 NM throughout all the Great Lakes, he and his wife Judy have been full time liveaboards for 20 years on Veleda IV, their 1978 Ontario 32, having sailed the east and west coasts of North America as well as the Mediterranean, North and Black Seas About the vessel "ANITRA" 40'9" x 9'6" x 5'6" Designed by A. Montye Macrea, Oakville, Ontario. The original ship's drawings show her name as "ADANAC IIII" - Macrea having built three previous "ADANAC"s - but before she was launched he named her "ANITRA", after a character in the Ibsen play "Peer Gynt". Built by Robertson Bros in Hamilton, Ontario, she has oak frames with cedar planking and a total sail area of 900 sq.ft. Her mainmast and some of her blocks come from "AGGIE", the famous racing cutter built by Captain Andrews in 1887 at Andrew's Shipyard on Oakville's 16 Mile Creek. A successful racing boat in her time "ANITRA" won the R.C.Y.C. "Edward Prince of Wales" Cup in 1939, the "Turnbull Trophy" in 1939, and the "Cecil G. Marlatt Memorial Trophy" in 1940. She has more than 100 racing pennants to her name. "ANITRA" has been sailing out of the Oakville Club for 90 years (2016) under the Macrae family burgee for the entire time. About Ray Peacock's model of the "Anitra" (2016) The model is built to a scale of 1:24, ½" to 1 ft, as she appears in 2016. Constructed mainly in Swiss pear, she is built "plank-on-frame" with all construction timbers as shown in her drawings. The spars and blocks are degamé (lemonwood), and the rigging is stainless steel wire and hand-made cotton rope. The sails are mylar, sewn to mast hoops of alder wood. Metal fittings are brass, chemically darkened to bronze or black. The cabin is fully finished as on the original, including a model of the engine located under the cabin entrance. She flies the Macrea Family burgee, the Oakville Club pennant and the Ontario Provincial flag. About Ray Peacock
Born and brought up in the village of Port Sunlight, the home of the soap company Lever Brothers, near the city of Liverpool, Ray has always lived near the sea and large lakes. As a boy he would often take the “Ferry ‘cross the Mersey” from Birkenhead to Liverpool, where he watched the ships that plied their trade from the wharves and docks of the city that grew on ship building and the commerce of the world, and which was the control centre of Atlantic Naval operations during WWII, known as “The Western Approaches”. He was also not far from the entrance to the Manchester Ship Canal, and would spend time watching the freighters of the world as they passed, opening the inland City of Manchester to international trade. Ray took a degree in Food Technology in London. He followed this with a career, first in the meat industry, then in the chocolate business. Ray and his family lived in a village near the ancient City of York, with a history dating back to Viking and Roman times, and an area hotly contested during the Civil War. Ray, his wife and three children were “exported” to Canada in 1971 by his company, and became Vice-president of Manufacturing of the Canadian branch of Rowntrees, the makers of Kit Kat, Coffee Crisp, Smarties, Black Magic and After Eight Mints. He took up ship modeling as a hobby during our Canadian winters, initially building from kits, but later graduating to scratch building. Ray is a member of Metro Marine Modellers, https://metromarine.org/. He is also a founding member of Model Shipwrights of Niagara, https://modelshipwrightsofniagara.weebly.com/. In addition to building his own models Ray also restores old and damaged models for private individuals and public institutions, to museum-quality standards of accuracy and finish of hulls and rigging. His Admiralty-style model of the 22-gun ship HMS “Ontario”, a “snow” which sank in the Lake in 1780, was built after considerable research, is considered to be the authentic model of the ship. Admiralty Surveyor Henry Wolsey Bayfield (1795-1885) spent four decades mapping Canada from the Lakehead to Labrador. Gord Laco returned to the Shellback Club to introduce us to Bayfield, one of the most extraordinary individuals of the nineteenth century. His detailed navigational charts literally mapped the way for settlement into the interior of the continent. About Gord Laco
Gordon Laco served on the Board of Directors of Tall Ships America 2015 to 2021, and currently sits on the Board of Tall Ships Canada. He supports the operations of sail training ships and maintenance of classic yachts in every way he can. He began his career in the marine industry in 1979 after studying history at the University of Western Ontario when he joined the staff of Toronto’s Tom Taylor Company, following in the footsteps of his late uncle, Con Costas. Gord has long-held respect for seamanship and an appreciation for traditional rigging. He began importing gear for sail training and museum ships in 1999 when he was Captain of HMS BEE, the reproduction gunboat schooner operated by the Ontario Government on the Upper Great Lakes. He began distributing rope and rigging across North America on a full-time basis in 2003 after returning from 18 months as Lead Technical Adviser to the production of the feature film ‘Master and Commander, the Far Side of the World’. He has served as historical advisor to over 60 film and television productions, recently working with Tom Hanks on the production of the WW2 drama GREYHOUND. Gord was co-founder of Atlantic Challenge Canada, served as Executive Director of Toronto Brigantine and has sat on the boards of Huronia Museum and Midland Public Library. Even though as a professional mariner he dislikes shipwrecks, he also sits on the board of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society. Gord is a frequent public speaker on issues involving seamanship, nautical history and youth development. He served eleven years as an officer in the Royal Canadian Navy and was, at the time of his commissioning, the oldest person to complete the RCN’s tough Basic Officer’s Training Course. Core to his operations is his company G. H. Laco & Son Ltd, which specializes in traditional gear for ships and yachts. He is proud that his son, Robert, has joined him in the business. When he has time, he races and cruises on the waters of Georgian Bay. Judith Alltree, our Shellback chaplain, returned to share an update on how the Mission to Seafarers has managed during COVID and now that in-person events are occurring again. About Judith Alltree
Judith was born and raised in Vancouver, BC, but moved to Toronto more years ago than she will admit to! A graduate of U of T in 1990, majoring in Political Science, and in 2003 from Wycliffe College Seminary with a Master’s Degree in Divinity, Judith was ordained as deacon and priest in the Anglican Church the same year. She was in parish ministry for the next nine years, as both curate in St. Andrew’s Scarborough for two years and incumbent of the Church of the Holy Spirit in Mississauga for seven years. Judith left parish ministry in 2012 with no fixed plans, but within four months she found herself at the Mission to Seafarers, and six months later was appointed Interim-Executive Director during the process of amalgamation with the Hamilton Mission to Seafarers. In January 2014, she was appointed Executive Director of the newly amalgamated Mission to Seafarers Southern Ontario. In June 2017, that new mission expanded with the opening the Terry Finlay Seafarers Centre in Oshawa, named for the former liaison bishop. In October 2019, Judith was appointed Regional Director of the newly incorporated Mission to Seafarers, Canada, which includes stations in Vancouver, Thunder Bay, Sarnia/Lake St. Clair, Windsor, Hamilton, Toronto, Oshawa, Saint John and Halifax. The organization is in the planning stages to open a Seafarers Welfare and Research station in St. John’s Newfoundland in 2023. The granddaughter of a Master Mariner in the Merchant Service, Judith is an honourary member of the Great Lakes Division of the Master Mariners Association, and sits on the board of directors for the Marine Club as Chaplain. Although she retired from her position as Executive Director of the Mission to Seafarers Southern Ontario in December, 2021, she returns as a board member this month. In her not-abundant spare time, Judith enjoys photography, making jewelry, reading real books with pages, music, theatre and films, and travelling, especially when it involves places of historical interest. However, it is her work with the Mission to Seafarers that has been the highlight of all three careers – never a job, always a joy. And of course, she is also the Chaplain for Shellbacks. Ron returned to the Shellback Club, this time to speak on the subject of a collection of nautical books gathered in the early 20th century by Irwin Hickson Forster, Ron's godfather's father. The books represent items from the mid 1800s to the 1920s, and cover a range of topics: nautical fiction, seamanship, histories, adventure, autobiographies, guides, and references — all topics that made parts of book collections of this sort. Today, with its blogs, web sites, and YouTube, the Internet takes "virtual sailors" around the world at the helms of our keyboards. Actual travel to distant locations is also made easier with radio and GPS, not to mention aircraft. One hundred years ago however, most people left their shores for distant locations by reading books. The books featured are:
About Ron Jenkins
Ron is a long-time member of the National Yacht Club. His father, Alf (past Purser Shellbacks, Class A Dinghy Sailor and an active keel boat owner) and his grandfather, Herb (NYC treasurer for decades, and active keel boat sailor) carries the Jenkins’ name well back in NYC history. Ron is an active nature and sailing photographer; when hobbies do not interfere, he works in technology marketing. He is an active participant in Waterfront for All, a coalition of groups protecting the Toronto waterfront. The Shellback Club watched two videos about the HMS Victory, the Napoleonic Warship. Part 1 looks at the physical ship, its dimensions, sails, and materials used to build it. Part 2 is an overview of how the ship runs/ran, the crew, the ammunition, etc. HMS Victory was Lord Nelson’s flagship in his victory at the Battle of Trafalgar on October 21st, 1805.
See also the Nautical Archeology Society web age on this vessel: https://www.nauticalarchaeologysociety.org/holland-no5-submarine. Melodie Schaffer returned to update the Shellback Club on her recent trans-Atlantic race: the Transat Jacques Vabre 2021. She provided an excellent slideshow of her boat (now named Whiskey Jack, and sponsored by Stormtech) and the life aboard during the race. Melodie is now in the middle of another ocean race, this time a circumnavigation: the Globe 40 Race. Details on Melodie and the Globe 40 race are here: https://www.globwww.globe40.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/LEG-1-WJ-FS.jpg. About Melodie Schaffer
Melodie has sailed and raced out of RCYC on variety of boats from dinghies (Laser, 470, I14) to keel boats (Shark, C+Cs, 8 Meter, J105). She currently owns a Dufour 34 at the RCYC. Four years ago, she began offshore racing. She sailed in the 2019-2020 Clipper Round the World Race in the Southern Ocean leg and the Asian leg. She was then to race across the Pacific in March 2020, but it was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A year ago, she bought a Class 40, a doublehanded offshore race boat. She trained for a couple weeks and then sailed the boat to France to compete in the Trans Jacques Vabre, a race from Le Havre, France to Martinique. This race draws the top sailors in the world. Competitors sail Ocean 50s, Class 40s, Ultims (100 foot triamarans) and Imoca 60s; all are racing doublehanded. She competed with a fellow Canadian and they are the first Canadians to finish the race. She was one of 14 women in the race, out of the 180 skippers. Melodie is currently in Auckland having just completed leg 3 of the Globe 40 Round the World race. She is a biomedical engineer by profession, and more recently a sailing photographer. She has three children, one in high school and two in university. |
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