Yankee Hero

Type

Sloop

Period

19th Century

Nation

United States

Overview: Yankee Hero was a real, working fishing sloop built in 1889, representative of the small, double-ended "Quoddy boat" or "Eastport pinky" type used along the Passamaquoddy Bay coast of eastern Maine. Handsome, seaworthy boats such as the Yankee Hero met the need for fast, easily-handled boats to transport sardines to the processing plants in eastern Maine. Specifications: According to the Smithsonian's description of the builder's half-model and rigged model, the boat measured about 37 feet 3 inches on deck, 12 feet 9 inches moulded beam, and 5 feet 8 inches moulded depth, drawing roughly 5 feet 3 inches aft and 3 feet forward. She had a double-ended, keel hull with strong sheer, a raking curved stem, a raking straight sternpost, a keel with much drag, greatest beam slightly forward of midlength, a sharp entrance, and a long, well-formed run, with a hard turn of bilge and pronounced hollow in the after sections. Like other Quoddy boats she was typically ballasted with locally obtained iron ore. Service History: Built at Lubec, Maine, and rigged jib-and-mainsail (sloop rig), Yankee Hero worked as a sardine carrier, ferrying fish from weir traps out to the canneries — a role that demanded speed and easy handling rather than large cargo capacity. She was considered a fine example of her builder's work, said to produce boats among the swiftest of the type. Notable Facts: The Smithsonian's National Watercraft Collection holds both a rigged model (USNM 76266) and the builder's half-model (USNM 76293) of Yankee Hero, which were used to document the lines of this vernacular Maine working-boat type for the historical record. Her lines and specifications were published in the Smithsonian's "Catalogue of the Watercraft Collection in the United States National Museum." The type is popular with scale modelers today; BlueJacket Shipcrafters produces a wooden kit of Yankee Hero based on the Smithsonian's original documentation, making her one of the more accessible representatives of the pinky/Quoddy boat tradition for builders.