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The Chesapeake Bay of Yore
Mainly About Rowing and Sailing Craft
F. Tilp c1982 <self published>.
"After the Civil War, boat building and shipbuilding flourished along
Alexandria's waterfront... demand for inexpensive houseboats for shipyard
workers and professional fishermen was met by the 'arkwrights' whose
initial and successful effort was the famed and popular "Potomac Ark".
...standard model called for a scow-like vessel, 20' long, 10' wide, draft
of 12", flat-bottomed, flat sides, sloping square ends with ... one room
with ceiling height of seven feet.
"...Eastern red cedar clapboard siding, red standing-seam tinned flat roof,
two windows, two doors, lighted by kero lamp or candles with a coal-fired
stove installed for heating and cooking. No engine or sail... only sweeps
or poles...
"Arks were anchored out or tied to ramshackle piers along the river's edge
usually on the western shore...inlets such as Battery Cove gave shelter
from floods and ice gorges.
"Shipyard workers found the arks to be convenient lodging when moored
near the job. Fishermen discovered arks to be ideal for economical living
quarters as well as adequate...for [a] workshop and box and barrel storage.
Then too, the occupants were free from real estate tax, municipal building
codes and health regulations... Sturgeon fishermen maintained 12 arks in
Quantico Creek; 5 were in Mallows Bay for salvage workers on the 212 WWI
wooden troopships there until the late 1930s; Ginston Cove had 7 arks used
by Eastern Shore eel fishermen, muskrat-trappers and frog-giggers.
"By the early 1920s and estimated 1000 tax-free arks lined the Virginia
shores from Little Falls to Quantico, having been forced out of
Washington's crowded harbor. During winter floods... the arks were brought
ashore and jacked up...
"As pollution increased, fishing and shipbuilding decreased, arks were sold
off to gamblers, yacht clubs, bootleggers, floating tomato canneries or
sawmills down river. Ark colonies grew, the largest being at Bull Town
Cove, a small Maryland harbor directly across from Mount Vernon where 15
more-or-less arks were located from the 1890s through the 1930s. Each was
engaged in a business catering to passing sailing vessels on their way to
and form Washington, Georgetown and Alexandria. It became *the friendly
meeting place* for all river-folk because of its prime location..."
"One ark was a ship's chandlery; others offered general merchandise, food,
clothes, haircuts, drugs and medicine, gaming tables, whiskey (rum during
winter) and maybe an effeminate social service or two. During the slot
machine era in Southern Maryland (1934-68) one such ark was packed with
these gambling devices...
"During WWII, ark colonies were rejuvenated for sensualistic business and
located near military establishments such as the Pentagon, Torpedo Plant,
Naval Research Laboratory, Fort Belvoir, Fort Hunt, Fort Washington, Naval
Power Factory at Indian Head, Quantico, and a few were snuggled away in
headwaters near the Naval Proving Grounds at Dahlgren. After that War, US
Public Health officials and do-gooders got rid of this....little craft."
"NOTE: A male frog being *propositioned* is shown in the lower right hand
corner of the drawing."
"
Chesapeake Arks - Kent County, Maryland
Photos by Craig O'Donnell,
April 1998.
Rock Hall
This ark is on Main Street in Rock Hall, Maryland as part of a watermen's
memorial dedicated to Stanley Van Sant. One thing all four Arks have in
common is that they're fiendishly hard to photograph, being perched next to
swamps or trees or what have you.
I don't think the side door is original - note that the end door is
planked up completely on one end and partially on the other. I'm sure the
original windows were less elaborate. The hull is a simple scow with one
long plank per side, and the cavils (cleats) look like they were cut from
2x6 lumber.
The Watermens Museum is about a mile further down Main Street. It's very
small but worth a visit. It's free. The ghostly figure in the second photo
is a waterman sculpted from a log with a chain saw.
Above: Front
Below: Rear, photographed by crawling under a pine tree.
This one below also is in Rock Hall, smack dab on Main Street. I call it
"Green Acres". It's a masterpiece of vernacular architecture. From the front
you wouldn't suspect a thing, or perhaps you'd expect Arnold the Pig.
But look at the rear. There's that scow hull and overhang,
with the porch turned into what must be an exterior store-room.
Surely the ark wasn't built with white siding and a peaked roof, so
sometime someone went to a lot of trouble to make it homey. I wonder
what the story is?
Comes complete with a brick chimney and airconditioner. TV too.
Believe it or not it's for sale as of May 1998.
Chestertown
This ark is located in Chestertown, Maryland, at a small marina.
According to the owner's wife, it was there 40 years ago and at the time it was
inhabited by "an old man". Since then it has been moved between a garage and a
shed. I doubt it will ever float again but the inside is well maintained since
the lady uses the shed to store her crafts projects and materials. I was able to
look inside but couldn't get a photo.
You can just see the end beam of the hull here, and the
porch. It's in a terrible location to get a photo; just to the left
there's a large tree and a huge power company utility box.
Here's the business end. I think the porch was boxed in on
this side to permit a standard door (notice the wainscoting). I'll
get back and write down some more details someday. I think it has,
or had, two small windows per side.
Betterton
There's a large derelict ark at the end of a gulch in Betterton,
Maryland, which is on the Sassafras River. Someone must have hauled it up to use
as a hunting cabin, because they added a lean-to and slapped tarpaper
everywhere, but now the whole thing is about to fall apart. [Better scans
coming. I hope].
This end faces the Sassafras River. You can just see the
side wall of the lean-to at the bottom right. The overhangs on this
ark are rounded (garvey-like) rather than straight as on the others.
This end faces the road. I got as far back as I could
without falling into the marsh. There's that lean-to. The odd
vertical thing is an electrical hook-up pole, but it's been
disconnected.
From this angle she looks almost like she must have when
afloat. The hull is quite deep - two wide planks tall - making for
plenty of headroom in the cabin. Nothing is plumb anymore, it's a
drunken boat.
With Shanty's Demise,
Watermen Became Commuters Between Home, Bay
by Cooky McClung
Kent County News
Thursday Jan 15, 1998
ROCK HALL - You see them only rarely now, mostly abandoned or beached as
something out of the past for tourists to gawk at - rudely made floating
shacks barely big enough to turn around in atop a hull shaped like a sled.
Once the shanties housed watermen on voyages up and down the Bay that
sometimes took them far from home for wearying months at a stretch They were
weatherproof snugly fitted with stoves and bunks. Towed behind workboats to
fishing grounds, watermen often put the sturdy little arks ashore dragging
them up sandy banks and securing them above the high water mark.
Along the winter fishing grounds surrounding Kent Island to the great
spawning areas running from Worton Point to Turkey Point the shanties lie
clustered like antique versions of the recreational vehicle parks we know
today. Made extinct by cars and paved roads only a handful nowadays can be
found - pieces of history splintering into obsolescence. Now a waterman can
leave his boat on the lower Shore, hop into a pickup truck and be home
within three or four hours.
Most shanties have vanished in recent years, regarded as useless relics
by descendants of the old watermen and allowed to rot, turned into kindling
or transformed into something else. In Kent, no more than three or four can
still be found - a couple in Rock Hall and one, in poor condition, in
Betterton. "Those shanties were an important part of history on the Eastern
Shore before workboats were equipped with cabins," said Ronald Fithian, now
a county commissioner and Rock Hall town officer but before that a longtime
waterman. "When watermen traveled to fish in better stocked waters they were
often gone for several months at a time, and they had to have some place to
live."
In those days, even short trips by land were not easy. "Before cars or
good loads, watermen hooked up these wooden shanties to their fishing boats
and took them to their fishing spots, leaving them on shore. At the end of
the day they'd have a place to sleep and eat. Usually the shanty could
accommodate two or three men, so it was pretty economical," said Fithian.
Even after cars were invented, the shanties remained in use for a long
while. "A drive from Rock Hall to Betterton in a Model T could be quite an
adventure," said Fithian. "You'd probably have to take a dozen extra tires
with you with the shape the roads were in. Even for that short distance, a
waterman didn't want to work all day and have to drive back home in those
conditions. Especially in bad weather."
Long before the Bay Bridge was even a glimmer of an idea, watermen
traveled from frozen Rock Hall to Kent Island for their winter catch.
'That's always been the best winter fishing," Fithian said. "I used to go
there a lot myself though shanties were obsolete by my time. If I hadn't
made a dime fishing all year, I could make it up in a week in that area."
In the early 1900s watermen towed their shanties from as far away as
Tilghman Island to the waters around Betterton during spawning season. "Even
today, 90 percent of all the rockfish on the East Coast spawn in that area."
said Fithian. "From the first of March until about the first of June, the
waters were plentiful with them."
The shanties remained a common part of the shoreline during Betterton's
shad fishing heydays. Accounts tell of big boats traveling from Baltimore to
dock in Betterton, where men would bid vigorously for the shad to sell in
city markets. Over the decades, newer boats built with cabins allowed
watermen to live aboard, and the little shanties were abandoned.
Fithian, and others whose livelihood depended on the water, believe
easier methods are not necessarily better. "Of course it was harder, but in
the days when shanties were used, the whole industry was probably better.
Hard as the life might have been back then, I can honestly say I'd love to
turn back the clock and be able to fish in the waters the way they once
were." But would he trade the comfort of his cabin to live for weeks in a
shanty? "You bet."
Ark II
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