Prohibition ended in 1933. Hemmingway had Pilar built by the Wheeler Company Coney Island in 1934 American Lafrance has been building fire engines for 175 years
Is a commercial sail and power yard
We wintered there because The Jake
Was in need to have her bottom tarred
Jim and Fog both agreed
The bullgine's life was over now
For safety's sake if nothing else
Besides it just didn't have enough power
The Jake needed iron wind
If he ever got in a nasty way
With waves or current on a lee shore
Without the right power we'd be gone for sure
The only other job that Wheeler hadÂ
Was a pleasure  boat a handsome yacht
They were building for a writer guy
Who would take her to Cuba as his home afloat
They welcomed The Jake with open arms
The yard crew knew that with two boats now
There'd be work all winter rare these days
So they quickly pulled Jake onto the ways
Mac Fog Jim  and I  were standing in the lofting shed
When Old Wheeler came to us and said
Like you to meet this writer guyÂ
whose boat over there is our other job
Up comes this guy with beard and grin
Hemmingway he said Ernest my name
But my friends call me Hem
The boat's Pilar and marlin riggedÂ
When she's done I'm off Havana bound
We shook hands all around and joked a bitÂ
We told him how The Jake came here
A laker being fitted for a carib run
He loved the tale and wished us well
Hem said he too was  a Great Lakes kid Â
Born and raised In MichiganÂ
Said he and Pilar would like to join
The Jake on the Gulfstream run
Hem seemed a decent sortÂ
We adjourned to the bar at the Sailor's Rest
Hem lived there as we did too
To plot our course gainst the Gulfstream's flow
Back up north Rick Blaine had paid
The Jake and crew a handsome price
To stand to and wait  near at hand
Seems the Rick was short on friends a bit
It wasn't long before Rick came byÂ
With a guy named Sam another great guy
They were in some trouble and needed a place
To hide out low till the smoke had cleared and passions cooled
He was accused of shootin his gangster boss
But it was a frame he couldn't prove
To our lights he was a stand up guy
We decided he was straight and true
We took them in and shared our rooms
Hem Fog and Rick bunked in oneÂ
Sam Jim and Mac slept in the next
Me as master got my own
 The Jake was stripped of his bottom planks
His frames and scantlings still in shape
The Wheeler boys checked the centerboards
And found them  and their boxes nice and sound
They pulled the bullgine and dumped her in
To act as an anchor for a mooring ball
We needed another but with more power
Rick New York born and bread
New all the tricks to get things done
Seems a pumper from NYFD
was wrecked while on a fire run
Her pump and diesel  was still in shape
The rest of her was total done
Rick knew where the pumper was
Jim and Fog they checked it out and
Decided the diesel was just the thing
The Jake needed to make a turn of speed
Rick paid the chief in cool hard cash
Mac Jim and me with Wheeler's truck and tools
Cut the rig from the LaFrance wreck
Brought it to Jake waitin in the ways
Now Jake 's a cargo topsail schoonerÂ
Flatbottomed and with centerboards
There's a large hold  below empty now
To take the the rig when we figured how
Jim being the college boy did the workÂ
To place the diesel  shaft and prop
But Fog and Hem were talking low
Off to one side and now they said
Lets see her run as she was intended
Pump and all before she's parted
So we hooked up both the fire hoses
suction in the water discharge on shore
She started with a fearsome growlÂ
And settled back to a lion's purr
With the pump engaged and the power on
It took three men to hold the discharge down
She was built to pump high pressure
Water on fires at over two hundred feet
The thrust that monster pump produced
Was more than all of us could ever dream
Hem and Fog conferred once more
They came up to us and said
That pump would push The Jake ahead
Faster Than any prop would do
Well that called for a meeting of all hands
The bar that night rang with talk
Made more creative after margaritas and salt
With muddled heads we saw it clear
The LaFrance pump would be Jake's gear
Jim Hem and Fog drew up the sketch
The wheeler boys just shook their heads
The Jake's going down was their refrain
Say goodbye me boys we'll not see ye again
Though they thought we were nuts
They did their best
And mounted diesel pump snug and fine
The discharge aft below the waterline
Jake's bottom was all copper sheathedÂ
with the plates all lapped from bow to stern
His bottom would be clean and fair
Nothing there to slow him down
As a topsail schooner with a square sail fore
The  Jake could pass most any sail
But power boats were just too fast
The Lake Ontario war had proven that
On a warm March day Jake was down the ways
He sat a bit below his lines
His new rig weighed more than the whisky did
A sea trial would tell if The Jake would mind
I paid the yard and  took on stores
Passed Liberty and made off shore
The Lafrance growling in the hold
A stream of water flowing out the stern
Jim set the diesel's revs to slow
I figured Jake about three knots
He handled well but both Jake and I
Felt this new iron wind a bit too odd
We had all hands plus Rick and Sam
Hem and Pilar were abeam to port
I called to Hem what's our speed
He shouted back we're a tad past three
It was time to see what The Jake would do
With this newfangled pump and power rig
Pilar' diesels would drive her to twenty
There's no way Jake would outrun Hem's baby
I stationed Fog up in the bow
With Mac to watch if the bilge wells rose
Jim stationed on the throttle and drive
Rick and Sam to relay commands
Jim pushed the throttle up to maxÂ
Old Jake leapt like a startled buck
He sat up straight on his shiny bottom
And left Pilar like she was stuck in the muck
Now The Jake doesn't have a keel as such
His centerboards keep him true on course
Without that keel he skipped so bad
I was certain he'd broach and kill all hands
I bellowed to Jim to shut it down
Just in time or we'd all been drown
Jake settled slow as sedate as you please
While we all took some collective breaths
I thought it out and dropped the boards
Just a a bit below the copper sheath
We did the run again and sure as hell
The Jake ran true passin Pilar well
We motored back to the mooring ball
As slow as you please but all hands knew
We had a trick that we could use
If we needed speed to beat persuit
Hem ferried us back to the yard
He couldn't believe what the Jake had run
Said Pilar was showing twenty plus
And Jake was simply still building speed
All hands decided not crow
So the Wheeler boys were told a tale
Of Jake movin at an amazing rate
Of six knots with all the throttle full
We set off on next morning's tide
Pilar and the Jake side by side
Rick Fog and Hem aboard Pilar
Mac Jim with Sam and I on The  Jake
The tale grows fast and wild from here
I'll be back in a while to tell it clear
Poetry by josephus
Read 770 times
Written on 2013-09-01 at 18:55
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X Lafrance and Hemmingway a Wild Ride... The Laird Jake
Wheeler's yard on Coney IslandIs a commercial sail and power yard
We wintered there because The Jake
Was in need to have her bottom tarred
Jim and Fog both agreed
The bullgine's life was over now
For safety's sake if nothing else
Besides it just didn't have enough power
The Jake needed iron wind
If he ever got in a nasty way
With waves or current on a lee shore
Without the right power we'd be gone for sure
The only other job that Wheeler hadÂ
Was a pleasure  boat a handsome yacht
They were building for a writer guy
Who would take her to Cuba as his home afloat
They welcomed The Jake with open arms
The yard crew knew that with two boats now
There'd be work all winter rare these days
So they quickly pulled Jake onto the ways
Mac Fog Jim  and I  were standing in the lofting shed
When Old Wheeler came to us and said
Like you to meet this writer guyÂ
whose boat over there is our other job
Up comes this guy with beard and grin
Hemmingway he said Ernest my name
But my friends call me Hem
The boat's Pilar and marlin riggedÂ
When she's done I'm off Havana bound
We shook hands all around and joked a bitÂ
We told him how The Jake came here
A laker being fitted for a carib run
He loved the tale and wished us well
Hem said he too was  a Great Lakes kid Â
Born and raised In MichiganÂ
Said he and Pilar would like to join
The Jake on the Gulfstream run
Hem seemed a decent sortÂ
We adjourned to the bar at the Sailor's Rest
Hem lived there as we did too
To plot our course gainst the Gulfstream's flow
Back up north Rick Blaine had paid
The Jake and crew a handsome price
To stand to and wait  near at hand
Seems the Rick was short on friends a bit
It wasn't long before Rick came byÂ
With a guy named Sam another great guy
They were in some trouble and needed a place
To hide out low till the smoke had cleared and passions cooled
He was accused of shootin his gangster boss
But it was a frame he couldn't prove
To our lights he was a stand up guy
We decided he was straight and true
We took them in and shared our rooms
Hem Fog and Rick bunked in oneÂ
Sam Jim and Mac slept in the next
Me as master got my own
 The Jake was stripped of his bottom planks
His frames and scantlings still in shape
The Wheeler boys checked the centerboards
And found them  and their boxes nice and sound
They pulled the bullgine and dumped her in
To act as an anchor for a mooring ball
We needed another but with more power
Rick New York born and bread
New all the tricks to get things done
Seems a pumper from NYFD
was wrecked while on a fire run
Her pump and diesel  was still in shape
The rest of her was total done
Rick knew where the pumper was
Jim and Fog they checked it out and
Decided the diesel was just the thing
The Jake needed to make a turn of speed
Rick paid the chief in cool hard cash
Mac Jim and me with Wheeler's truck and tools
Cut the rig from the LaFrance wreck
Brought it to Jake waitin in the ways
Now Jake 's a cargo topsail schoonerÂ
Flatbottomed and with centerboards
There's a large hold  below empty now
To take the the rig when we figured how
Jim being the college boy did the workÂ
To place the diesel  shaft and prop
But Fog and Hem were talking low
Off to one side and now they said
Lets see her run as she was intended
Pump and all before she's parted
So we hooked up both the fire hoses
suction in the water discharge on shore
She started with a fearsome growlÂ
And settled back to a lion's purr
With the pump engaged and the power on
It took three men to hold the discharge down
She was built to pump high pressure
Water on fires at over two hundred feet
The thrust that monster pump produced
Was more than all of us could ever dream
Hem and Fog conferred once more
They came up to us and said
That pump would push The Jake ahead
Faster Than any prop would do
Well that called for a meeting of all hands
The bar that night rang with talk
Made more creative after margaritas and salt
With muddled heads we saw it clear
The LaFrance pump would be Jake's gear
Jim Hem and Fog drew up the sketch
The wheeler boys just shook their heads
The Jake's going down was their refrain
Say goodbye me boys we'll not see ye again
Though they thought we were nuts
They did their best
And mounted diesel pump snug and fine
The discharge aft below the waterline
Jake's bottom was all copper sheathedÂ
with the plates all lapped from bow to stern
His bottom would be clean and fair
Nothing there to slow him down
As a topsail schooner with a square sail fore
The  Jake could pass most any sail
But power boats were just too fast
The Lake Ontario war had proven that
On a warm March day Jake was down the ways
He sat a bit below his lines
His new rig weighed more than the whisky did
A sea trial would tell if The Jake would mind
I paid the yard and  took on stores
Passed Liberty and made off shore
The Lafrance growling in the hold
A stream of water flowing out the stern
Jim set the diesel's revs to slow
I figured Jake about three knots
He handled well but both Jake and I
Felt this new iron wind a bit too odd
We had all hands plus Rick and Sam
Hem and Pilar were abeam to port
I called to Hem what's our speed
He shouted back we're a tad past three
It was time to see what The Jake would do
With this newfangled pump and power rig
Pilar' diesels would drive her to twenty
There's no way Jake would outrun Hem's baby
I stationed Fog up in the bow
With Mac to watch if the bilge wells rose
Jim stationed on the throttle and drive
Rick and Sam to relay commands
Jim pushed the throttle up to maxÂ
Old Jake leapt like a startled buck
He sat up straight on his shiny bottom
And left Pilar like she was stuck in the muck
Now The Jake doesn't have a keel as such
His centerboards keep him true on course
Without that keel he skipped so bad
I was certain he'd broach and kill all hands
I bellowed to Jim to shut it down
Just in time or we'd all been drown
Jake settled slow as sedate as you please
While we all took some collective breaths
I thought it out and dropped the boards
Just a a bit below the copper sheath
We did the run again and sure as hell
The Jake ran true passin Pilar well
We motored back to the mooring ball
As slow as you please but all hands knew
We had a trick that we could use
If we needed speed to beat persuit
Hem ferried us back to the yard
He couldn't believe what the Jake had run
Said Pilar was showing twenty plus
And Jake was simply still building speed
All hands decided not crow
So the Wheeler boys were told a tale
Of Jake movin at an amazing rate
Of six knots with all the throttle full
We set off on next morning's tide
Pilar and the Jake side by side
Rick Fog and Hem aboard Pilar
Mac Jim with Sam and I on The  Jake
The tale grows fast and wild from here
I'll be back in a while to tell it clear
Poetry by josephus
Read 770 times
Written on 2013-09-01 at 18:55
Save as a bookmark (requires login) Write a comment (requires login) Send as email (requires login) Print text
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