Saturday, January 29, 2011

Wooden Ships On the Water—Or in a Box

A scale model wooden boat, battery powered, though there is no remote control of any kind. I guess this would be for a bathtub or very small pond, although I'm not sure I'd want to be in the bathtub with something electrical, lol. There is no date on the box or the little boat itself. The only type on the box is the "Wooden Scale Model Boats" cursive logo on the front overlaying the illustration. That illustration by the way, doesn't match the boat inside. There is also "2.98" in pencil on the front, which leads me to believe this was probably a purchase at the Army PX in Japan in the early 1950s. Other items I know were bought on-base also have simple penciled in prices on them. This toy boat measures approximately eleven inches long, and is in great condition, as is the original box.

Pencil drawing of a three-masted schooner. I don't know the story behind this illustration but it's framed and sealed on the back, and appears to be an original. There is no signature that I can see, but it's really nicely drawn. The ship appears larger than a typical New England whaling ship, but I really know nothing about boats. 

The lyrics to one of my favorite songs:

Wooden Ships
by David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Paul Kanter

If you smile at me, I will understand
'Cause that is something everybody everywhere does 
in the same language.
I can see by your coat, my friend,
you're from the other side,
There's just one thing I got to know,
Can you tell me please, who won?
Say, can I have some of your purple berries?
Yes, I've been eating them for six or seven weeks now,
haven't got sick once.
Probably keep us both alive.

Wooden ships on the water, very free and easy,
Easy, you know the way it's supposed to be,
Silver people on the shoreline, let us be,
Talkin' 'bout very free and easy...
Horror grips us as we watch you die,
All we can do is echo your anguished cries,
Stare as all human feelings die,
We are leaving - you don't need us.

Go, take your sister then, by the hand,
lead her away from this foreign land,
Far away, where we might laugh again,
We are leaving - you don't need us.

And it's a fair wind, blowin' warm,
Out of the south over my shoulder,
Guess I'll set a course and go...

• Wooden Ships by Crosby, Stills & Nash, live version from 1977.
• Or the original studio version here.

7 comments:

  1. One of my favorites from Crosby, Stills,and Nash. What a great song.
    As attractive as they are for this purpose, it saddens me that your checkerboards have been relegated to display backdrops instead of being used as originally intended. Hope you find the time moving forward - just set a course and go...

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  2. thanks, PX. I always tell people if they get tire of hanging my work on the wall they can make furniture out of it, lol. I'll get back to these sooner or later I promise.

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  3. THAT SHIP PICTURE COULD BE WORTH ALOT OR NOTHING.MY SON IN LAW AND DAUGHTER STOPPED AT A GARAGE SALE HERE IN FLORIDA AND BOUGHT SEVERAL SAILING SHIP PICTURES FOR HARDLY NOTHING A FEW YEARS AGO.THE SAME PICTURES WERE APPRAISED FOR THOUSANDS ON AN ANTIQUE TV SHOW I WATCH NOW AND THEN.HE DIDN'T KNOW AT THE TIME WHAT THEY WERE WORTH EXCEPT THEY LIKED THE PICTURES. WHAT CHANCE OF THAT HAPPENING TO ME. ZERO. I WISH I KNEW THE ARTIST NAME. I DON'T EVEN KNOW IF THEY STILL HAVE THOSE PICTURES. SO WHO KNOWS WHAT YOU HAVE IN YOUR ATTIC JUNK OR TREASURES. ONE THING YOU'LL NEVER STARVE.

    GRANNY

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  4. Yikes, I can't remember if it was my boat or one of my kids boat, but it was fun in the tub and was powered by baking soda and vinegar. No fear of being electrocuted!

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  5. I remember those baking soda and vinegar boats -- mine was a submarine! It looked like the Nautilus (the real one, not the Disney one).

    This model is very cool. There is something so elegant about old wooden boats -- Chris-Craft, Hacker, Century -- they are rivaled in beauty and elegance only by old cars! Hacker is still in the business of making them and they have a neat website:

    www.hackerboat.com

    We can dream, can't we?

    Paul, NYC

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  6. Its a warship, not a schooner. Cannon ports.

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    Replies
    1. oh, thank you! I thought those were some sort of fancy porthole decorations!

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