Boat used by Steinbeck takes another step in restoration

The first phase of restoring the Western Flyer fishing boat is nearing completion in Port Townsend, Washington, and its return to Monterey is tentatively set for next fall.

The 76-foot purse seiner was chartered by author John Steinbeck and marine biologist Ed Ricketts for a biological collecting trip to the Sea of Cortez in 1940. Steinbeck’s notes from the trip resulted in the book, “Log From the Sea of Cortez.”

The nonprofit Western Flyer Foundation plans to base the boat in Monterey and use it as a floating classroom for scientific studies.

On Dec. 4 the cabin, or wheelhouse, of the Western Flyer was reattached. It had been removed to make it easier to work on the boat’s hull. Shipwrights had to move the boat outside to give the crane room to lift the cabin onto the hull. It was the first time the Western Flyer had been outside since it was moved into the Port Townsend Shipwrights Cooperative for restoration.

Western Washington State is having a very wet year. But on the day of the rollout the sun came out, said Chris Chase, director of the Western Flyer Restoration.

“The clouds parted on a brisk day. …,” Chase said. “The gods shined down on The Western Flyer. … The next day it rained like crazy.”

In photos, the freshly painted vessel gleams in the sunlight. It’s a far cry from the corpse-like appearance it had after sinking twice in Puget Sound. The boat is painted white, black and turquoise, the colors of sister fishing boats built by Western Boat Building Co. in Tacoma, Washington, in the 1930s and 1940s. The hull will be painted red.

The remating of the cabin and the hull was a big page-turner in phase one of the restoration, Chase said. Thus far some 25,000 hours of work have gone into the project. In the next four months, decking and interior bulkheads will be added and the cabin will be bolted down.

Above the cabin is an open-air flying bridge that was part of the original Western Flyer.

The wheelhouse’s interior is just like it was when Steinbeck and Ricketts chartered the vessel.

“The house is almost original,” Chase said. “Nothing had been changed on the boat.”

The nine beds are there (eight for the crew and one for the captain). That was how the boat was set up for sardine fishing.

“The original table where Steinbeck sat is there,” Chase noted. “It gave us a clean plate to work back from. … You never get an opportunity like that. There’s always major alterations done. The boat had never been altered inside. It’s pretty amazing.”

Phase two of the project will be the mechanical phase. The main engine (a 425-horse power John Deere diesel) will be installed along with hydraulic and electrical systems. A hybrid component will be part of the drive system as well. It will be used for slow-speed operations under electric power. The hybrid component will take the engine offline for speeds below 1.5 knots.

“It is something that we are very committed to having in the boat,” Chase said.

Phase 3 will begin after The Western Flyer returns to Monterey, in September or October of 2022. That, Chase said, will be the icing on the cake. It will be completed in the fall of 2022 and the winter of 2023 in Moss Landing.

Work will include setting up the classroom and scientific equipment. Emily Gottliev, curriculum director for the Western Flyer restoration, is continuing to develop scientific lesson plans, Chase said. About 15 Monterey Bay Area schools are involved in the project to date.

A grant from the U.S. Navy for research work also is in the works, Chase said.

“Things are starting to gel with programs in the works but have not been on the fire,” Chase said.

You can view videos of the restoration on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHWSSOylIrE). They give you a close look at the painstaking work that has gone into the project.

“As you see the boat … it’s less than 10 percent original and 90 percent new,” Chase observed. But 95 percent of the wheelhouse is original.

Shipwrights, Chase explained, used a 50-year measuring stick to determine which wood to keep and which to replace on the hull. If the wood would last for another 50 years, it was kept. If not, it was replaced.

For the wheelhouse workers used a 10-year measuring stick. If the wood would last 10 more years, it was kept. If not, it was replaced.

Chase said all of the Western Flyer’s sister ships are gone, making it a special piece of history in spite of the Steinbeck-Ricketts connection.

“I think the boat has a ghost spirit, a guiding spirit,” he said. “It’s hard to dispute that the one boat that was supposed to survive survived.”

The Western Flyer Foundation, the project’s funding arm, is still looking for donations to complete the restoration. For information, visit [email protected] or call 949-903-6873. T-shirts and boat relics are available for donations.

Western Flyer at a glance

• Length: 76 feet.
• Beam: 20 feet.
• Built: In 1937 by Martin Petrich Sr., owner of Western Boat Building Co. in Tacoma, Washington
• Type: Purse seiner
• Weight: 110 tons.
• Use: Harvesting sardines and perch in Monterey Bay until the 1960s. Later used to harvest salmon, perch and crab, from California to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.
• Significance: Chartered by Ed Ricketts and John Steinbeck in 1940 for their six-week biological collecting expedition to the Sea of Cortez. The expedition resulted in Steinbeck’s 1951 book “Log From the Sea of Cortez.”
• Original owner: Tony Berry and Martin Petrich Sr. Berry was the captain for the Sea of Cortez expedition.
• Other owners: Western Flyer has had many owners, including businesses and individuals. In 1976, Clarence Fry bought it for $30,000. He renamed it Gemini. Later it was purchased by Ole Knudson and his father of Anacortes, Washington, at auction in 1986. Purchased in 2011 by real estate developer Gary Kehoe, with plans to use it in a hotel in Salinas. Sold to John Gregg in 2015 for $1 million.
• Number of sinkings: Three and a half times. Besides the two sinkings in Washington state, the boat grounded on a reef in southeast Alaska in 1971 and was nearly lost. In the 1960s it nearly sank in Prince William Sound.
• Current location: Port Townsend, Washington, where it is being restored by Port Townsend Shipwrights Co-Op for use as a floating scientific classroom in Monterey.
• Restoration group: The nonprofit Western Flyer Foundation, established in 2016. Information: [email protected].
• Cost of restoration: $4 million to $5 million.
• Return to Monterey Bay fall of 2022.
• Final work on scientific classroom: Fall of 2022 and winter of 2023 in Moss Landing.
• Named to the National Historic Registry because it is one of the best known vessels associated with California’s sardine fishery.