The Boston Harbor Hermit (episode 241)

Transcript

Music

Jake:
[0:05] Welcome to hub history where we go far beyond the freedom trail. To share our favorite stories from the history of boston, the hub of the universe.
This is episode 2 41, the Boston Harbor Hermit.
Hi, I’m jake. This week, I’ll be talking about an eccentric woman named Ann Winsor Sherwin Along with her son William.
She made a cozy home on an abandoned four masted schooner that ran aground off spectacle island for about 12 years.
Against all odds, she managed to hold off agents of the ship’s owners, the health Commission, the Coast Guard and the boston Harbor police,
abandoned by her no good husband who thought he could make it big in Hollywood and and her three Children were destitute and homeless until they set up a home on the schooner, riding out the great depression rent free on boston Harbor.

[0:58] In episode 238, which aired right before Christmas, I reintroduced the hermit of Hyde Park, who initially appeared alongside the Boston Harbor Hermit in episode 19.
Back then, each story was delivered in about five or 10 minutes and the research behind the stories didn’t take much longer.
After realizing that I now have the means to do justice to the story of the Hyde Park hermit.
I knew I’d have to revisit the boston Harbor hermit as well.
Recent podcast guest Pavlyuchenkova from episode 239, shared some of her research with me and our Patreon sponsors have also enabled me to do deeper research in the Boston Globe Archives.
That’s why I’m grateful for listeners like Stephen H and Kathleen M from Ireland, the latest listeners to support the show on Paypal.

[1:48] When listeners like them commit to giving $2 $5 or even $10 a month.
That consistency allows us to maintain a subscription to the globe archives.
That subscription enabled me to take a much deeper look at an Winsor Sherwin is life on the schooner that I could way back in March 2017 when the first episode mentioning are aired,
along with better access to sources are supporters also allow us to pay for web hosting and security, podcast, media hosting and online audio processing tools to clean up the way the show sounds,
to everyone who chips in to help me make up history.
Thank you If you’re not yet supporting the show and you’d like to start, just go to patreon dot com slash hub history or visit hub history dot com and click on the support us link and thanks again to all our new and returning sponsors.

[2:40] And now it’s time for this week’s main topic back in february 2010 at the height of the great recession, the globe interviewed an associate professor at,
UMass boston who was riding out the tough economic times by living on a houseboat of the constitution marina in Charlestown,
The Leaky 26 ft Sea Ray, he rents lacks an oven a shower or closets for his clothes.
A few weeks ago, he awoke to find the motorboat slowly sinking into the icy water in its slip, But it costs them just $200 a month when the water hasn’t frozen and the boat’s not sinking.
It’s really not that bad, he said on a recent night as he kept warm below deck with a space heater.
Right now, it’s the right price.

[3:23] Doesn’t exactly sound like the lap of luxury, but in a pinch, anything will do.
That was a lesson that an earlier generation learned during earlier tough times.
Even before the Great Depression began, the boston herald traveler featured human interest stories about people like john Sullivan who lived in the houseboat dawn in the south boston boatyard in 1928 Or the family who plan to convert the Schooner Herbert L.
Rod into a houseboat in 1929.
Then later in 1929, the global economy collapsed.
Here. In boston, desperate people would end up living in just about any place they could, from shanty towns along the railroad tracks.
In east boston, two underpasses to the many boats anchored along the waterfront,
In 1932, the globe even reported on an 80 year old man named Dewald, Nel Brown, whose houseboat wasn’t even in the water anymore, but on land at city point where he was being sued by the landowner, wanted to develop it.

[4:25] In 1935 the herald ran a piece on the many houseboats on the harbor from the fleet tied up near North Station and rented out by Charles Fallon to the cozy motor launch that Charles mayor renovated after trading a stamp collection for it.
They even interviewed an out of work bandleader who hosted dances on summer evenings with his musician friends on a float among the houseboat communities.
Most of these houseboats were owned or rented by their inhabitants, but some were hulks abandoned by the rightful owners is demand for shipping plummeted along with stock prices.
Many of the abandoned vessels were grounded in traditional shipbreaking areas, like the mouth of Chelsea Creek, but some had been tied up at Pierre’s downtown in Southie, Chelsea Charlestown and East boston and the owners eventually just stopped paying their rent,
leading to protracted legal battles between the squatters, the owners and the boston wharf companies.

[5:20] One of these battles revolved around the Snetind an enormous four masted schooner that had hauled coal up and down the east coast for decades until it put into Boston for repairs in 1928, and never left.
An article in the January 22, 1936 edition of the Boston Herald reported on the lawsuit between the owners of the sweetened and the Wharf in East Boston, where the ship had been quietly moldering for most of a decade,
because mrs Ann Winsor refuses to leave her home on board the ancient four masted schooner smitten more to the Federal wharf in East boston.
The owners of the vessel in a coal company, which formerly operated. It have been cited to appear in Suffolk Superior Court friday and contempt proceedings.

[6:05] While an involved legal battle was being waged with the ultimate aim of having the schooner removed from the wharf, mrs Winsor her son William, and their german shepherd dog, held the ford in the aged windjammer last night,
cut off from the world by the simple expedient of hauling up the rope, which affords their sole access to the dock.

[6:24] Judge joseph Walsh in Suffolk Superior Court yesterday refused the petition of the Montgomery Navigation Company, owners of the vessel for an injunction restraining Mrs Winsor from occupying the schooner.
Last october the wharf company sued James W. Gorman of Worcester, and the Gorman Leonard cole company of boston, to have the vessel removed.
It was alleged that Gorman had docked the Schooner in 1929, but docking fees have not been paid since 1934,
Contempt proceedings arose from the failure of the owners to move the ship by December 19 is the court had previously ordered In court yesterday.
The owners claim that their plan to tow this net in 15 miles to Sitan Sinker could not be carried out with passengers on board.
Judge Walsh saw nothing to prevent cutting her adrift or taking her to another mooring Mrs Sherwin declared that she would not leave the vessel even afforded by the court until she had had her day in court.
Mrs Sherwin told the court that she had lived on the Schooner Smitten since 1930 with her son and her dog.
She said she had her belongings on board and had an equity in the vessel.
There had been an agreement in writing July 2, 1930, she said, with Gorman, she refused to tell the name of the person who now had custody of this agreement.

[7:44] So unspooling that a little bit in an earlier suit, the owners of Federal Wharf got the court to order the owners of the sweatin to remove the ship from the dock by December 19, 1936 after the docking fees went unpaid for about two years.
The owners of the ship claimed that they were planning to comply, but couldn’t because an Winsor Sherwin her adult son, William, and their dog were living aboard, Since the ship was still tied up at Federal Wharf after the December 19 deadline came and went.
The war phoners PRESTA contempt complaint against the shipowner for defying the court order, while the owners asked for an injunction ordering the Sherwin off the vessel, As described in the globe, on January 22, 1936.

[8:27] Alleging that the presence of mrs Ann Winsor of boston aborted schooner.
This netting prevents it from carrying out the order of the court to remove the schooner from the wharf of the Federal wharf Company.
The Montgomery navigation Company of boston yesterday filed in Suffolk Superior Court, a bill in equity asking that the court and joined mrs Winsor from occupying the schooner.
The Montgomery navigation Company is being charged by the Federal Wharf Company with contempt of court for failure to comply with the court order to move the schooner.

[8:56] On the question of issuing a temporary injunction to enjoin mrs Winsor from boarding occupying or keeping her personal effects on the schooner.
Judge joseph Walsh yesterday denied the motions for injunctions and denied the request for an order of notice on the case, saying in substance that he did not see how her presence prevented the petitioners from cutting the vessel adrift or mooring her at another wharf.
The petition of hers that the petitioner wishes to Obey the court’s order to remove the vessel, but mrs Winsor’s presence prevents because it will be necessary to tow the vessel 15 miles to see and destroyer by burning our explosives.
In the end, the court essentially said, you have to get this ship out of here.
Not my problem. If somebody’s living on it after the court’s ruling, the shipowners promptly made arrangements for the Staten to be towed away from Federal wharf, under the assumption that the Sherwin would have to leave rather than being stuck on a ship moored in the middle of the harbor,
or even worse being stuck on a ship when it was deliberately sunk in the outer harbor.

[9:59] The companies involved did not yet understand how tenacious and Winsor Sherwin could be when she was hanging onto the ship, she thought was rightfully hers.
A follow up article in the Herald three days later said Mrs an Winsor Sherwin schooner dweller is about to lose her floating home at East boston,
although she told Judge joseph Walsh in the Superior Court yesterday that she would not give up the ship until she has her day in court.

[10:24] The ancient schooner smitten, on which she has lived for five years with her son William and her dog is to be towed to sea as soon as the United States Army engineers give the required permission,
and two of the vessels now blocking her exit from the slip at Federal War for moved temporarily.
One of the three members of the statins, unusual crew left yesterday,
while mrs Sherwin was testifying in court agents at the Animal Rescue League summoned by the East boston Police visited the vessel and took away the shepherd dog that had been the woman’s companion and protector.

[10:59] Taking away someone’s dog is a low down dirty trick, so I was gratified to read in the evening edition of the herald, on the same day.
Arnot, taken from the craft yesterday by the Animal Rescue League was returned today by newspaperman.

[11:18] And Winsor Sherwin in the Montgomery Navigation Company, essentially called each other’s bluffs.
The Company didn’t believe that the Sherwin family, including the recently returned Arno, would stay on board if the boat was moved.
The Sherwin is didn’t believe that the company would move the boat if they stayed on board.
And the showdown came the next day with the Boston Herald reporting on January 26, 1936,
the four masted schooner Snetind was towed from a snug berth at nice boston wharf yesterday to a windy Anchorage off Castle Island, but this action failed to drive off its mistress of five years.
Mrs Ann, Winsor Sherwin and her son William and a shepherd dog.
They’ll never make me leave, no matter what they do was her ultimatum from a porthole. As three tugs pull this net and stern first into the stream, and then turned her about toward the upper harbor.

[12:13] The schooners anchored a considerable distance off the island, and one leaky lifeboat is aboard.
The stevedores were instructed not to interfere with the Sherwin if they attempted to row ashore, but to prevent them from going aboard again in the event they left,
despite testimony to the contrary in Suffolk Superior Court friday, The Snowden appeared seaworthy as she was turned about in the stream and headed toward Castle Island.
The mizzen mast leaned forward at a dangerous angle, but did not seem to be shaken any by the wind.
When the craft began to move, the Sherwin have food and beverage.
For about a week, just before the schooner sailed, a boy brought aboard a quantity of milk and ginger ale, mrs Sherwin volunteered information that they had a week’s supply of food, mostly canned goods.
Neither mother nor son could be convinced that the schooner was actually to be towed away when the craft started to move away from the dock, both opened portholes and the shepherd dog barked furiously.

[13:15] The Sherwin may have been skeptical, but the company meant business and their home was soon floating in an offshore Anchorage.
The Sherwin didn’t have a boat at least not a boat with less than four masts, the kind you could use to actually get to shore with.
That was fine with the wharf company but maybe not so good for the Montgomery company that owned this net in now there were still squatters on their ship and they didn’t have a way to get to shore if they wanted to.
Not that they wanted to And struck a defiant tone. In an interview published by the Boston Globe on January 27, 1936.

[13:54] This boat has been my home for five years. They’ve tried to get me off before, but I have a right on board established by my purchase and possession.
I wasn’t scared when they said they told to see and blow it up. I knew they wouldn’t dare except for the cold. I don’t mind being here.
It’s a beautiful Anchorage, lovely scenery all around even if the wind blows from the rendering plant said mrs Sherwin pointing the spectacle island which is also known as the isle of odors.
I’ll think of the lovely scenery as a side note if you want to know more about the rendering plant that was located on spectacle island at this time and the garbage incinerator that followed it.
Listen to episode 2 39 where I interview Pavlyuchenkova about her book Urban archipelago.
The article continues.
They think they can starve me out said mrs Sherwin yesterday after she appeared on deck dressed in blue slacks, a pink sweater and wearing a yellow silk handkerchief bound around her head.
As she spoke to her interviewer, her son stood by saying, you tell a mom, no, I’m not leaving the ship.
I’ll stand by until I’m thrown off. What good captain ever deserted the ship?
I come of the windsors of massachusetts. A seagoing stock. We never give up a ship.
They won’t starve me either. The seas are free and there are plenty of good Samaritans for seafarers in distress.

[15:23] We’ll soon see how well an Winsor Sherwin held up Oliver hazard. Perry’s old battle cry.
Don’t give up the ship, but calling herself the descendant of an old massachusetts. Seagoing family was a bit of a stretch.
Her father and his father were from Rhode island while her paternal grandfather was from new york and her mother’s side of the family was from michigan.
I couldn’t find a lot of detail on the family beyond that, but a newsletter for divers called the lookout published this biographical brief on an in their winter 2016 edition.

[15:57] Born in July of 1882 in Stanton Michigan to Franklin Dolton, Winsor and Anna Johnson Winsor And Winsor was the eldest child and sibling to three younger brothers Based on the 1910 U.
S. Census and Winsor have been living in New York City.

[16:15] The historical record doesn’t state how she met her husband, but on January 20, 1910 and Winsor married louis Sherwin in Hoboken New Jersey, becoming his second wife And gave birth to a daughter.
Sylvia Winsor Sherwin on May 6, 1909 in Manhattan, just a note that that was eight months before their wedding.

[16:41] Louis Sherwin divorced his first wife, actress Maude Fealy in September 1909, a few months after the birth of Sylvia louis and and went on to have two more Children,
Daphne in 1911 and William in 1912.

[16:58] I don’t think louis Sherwin was a great guy. He worked as a film and theater critic for the new york Globe, eventually trying his hand as a script writer himself.
Sometime before their oldest child turned nine, Hollywood came calling for Lewis and he made it very clear that Hollywood hadn’t said anything about a wife and kids.
He left his family behind on Long Island and struck out for California, where his big break came with a silent film bonds of love starring boston native pauline Frederick, one of the few silent film stars to successfully make the jump to talkies.

[17:35] The film’s modest success helped establish louis as a Hollywood personality and ensure that he wouldn’t be heading home to his wife and Children anytime soon.
The packet of promotional materials for Goldwyn pictures 1919 lineup titled this is a Goldwyn year present service book includes this description of the picture and louis Sherwin role in it.

[17:58] Pauline Frederick’s latest Goldwyn picture bonds of love by louis Sherwin the eminent dramatic critic is a powerful emotional photo drama worthy of the sterling ability of the versatile star.

[18:11] When a dramatic critic with a national reputation for keen dramatic values, turns author, the product of his pen is likely to contain the very points which he has been called upon in the past to criticize adversely.
This opportunity has come to louis Sherwin Mr Sherwin before his association with the photo drama was for eight years the dramatic critic of the New York Globe,
in which capacity is fairness as a reviewer resulted in his being barred from certain theaters whose place he was daring enough to report is unworthy.
However, Mr Sherwin weathered the store. In fact, his firm stand for honest criticism added immeasurably to his prestige.
Now, Mr Sherwin has begun to write in a creative vein and his first story bonds of Love has been picture Rised by Goldwyn with pauline Frederick.
Louis. Sherwin was born and educated in England for several years.
He was a close student of dramatic literature and when he came to America joined the staff of the Globe for the past year, Mr Sherwin has been engaged in a critical capacity at the Goldman Studios in culver city California,
where his ability as a critic was utilized in the selection of stories suitable for a Picture Ization.

[19:29] The Motion picture News of november 15th 1919 reviewed Sherwin debut, effort and found it formulaic, but not necessarily in a bad way.

[19:40] Goldwyn has succeeded after many attempts in finding suitable material for pauline Frederick’s emotional talent.
If louis Sherwin had her in mind when he conceived bonds of love, then he surely has her personality gauge to a nicety.
Mr Sherwin has gone into the Land of Mother Love for his theme and has come out with a familiar formula, but a formula which takes on an appealing freshness, so surely does he relies on the dramatic values.
His technique is faultless, insofar as any false conceptions are concerned.

[20:15] The November 7, 1919 edition of variety was a little more guarded in his praise of Sherwin is writing,
bonds of love is at the Strand this week, and proved to be an acceptable and simple narrative of love for a man and a child set in the surroundings of a millionaire.
What stories the Sherwin could write if he would. Those who remember as clever, often brilliant contributions to local criticism can imagine.
But let him start slowly. He has devised a story that any first class exhibitor can buy with profit, particularly if he wants high class patronage.

[20:53] While lewis Sherwin was often Hollywood living the high life.
His estranged wife and three Children were destitute on Long Island In the early 20s and set up a home in an abandoned mill building on the estate of the cliffs.
A mansion built in the 1860s for New York Hospital President James William Beekman.
The home itself stood on a high bluff overlooking a beach along Oyster Bay on Long Island Sound and the village of Mill neck.
As the village name implies, there are several old mill ponds in the vicinity of the cliffs, so it’s hard to be sure where the old mill where the Sherwin made their home was exactly.
There were several attempts to evict the family in 1922 and 1923.
While Lewis was having a grand old time getting engaged to a beautiful movie star, according to a profile written for the website find a grave during this period.
Her estranged husband, now a screenwriter for Samuel Golden Pictures in Hollywood, publicly announced his engagement to film star mary miles Minter.

[21:58] And refused to grant her husband a divorce, which effectively ended his engagement to MS mentor.
And she countersued for support.
A Los Angeles judge deemed her a paltry $140 a month in compensation, Which was less than 1% of her husband’s annual earnings In a calculated act of retribution and of his own volition.
Lewis voluntarily surrendered himself to the authorities in 1920 for for nonpayment of alimony as a member of the alimony club at new york’s minimum security ludlow street jail.
He made mary serving a six month sojourn, emerging clean of conscience and absolved of any future financial obligations to and and his Children,
in a quirk of divorce law that apparently doesn’t exist anymore, louis could completely dodge the alimony A judge had ordered him to pay by serving a six month sentence and the ultimate country club jail in New york’s Lower East side.
This was the same jail where Tammany Hall’s boss Taeed died in custody about 50 years earlier.
Louis Sherwin Stay, there would be less fatal with the August 16, 1924, New York Times reporting,
louis Sherwin a scenario writer, formerly a new york, dramatic critic, was sent to ludlow street jail yesterday on a Supreme Court commitment because he owed alimony of $2775 to his wife and Winsor Sherwin.

[23:28] When Sherwin was taken to jail, He inquired whether he would have facilities for writing there, and was told that he would have ample opportunity and plenty of time because he would remain there for six months unless he paid off.

[23:42] While Lewis was catching up on his writing from behind bars. His wife and Children were living a desperate hand to mouth existence.
A february 7th 1956 boston globe retrospective about the Sherwin ins explains how an Winsor Sherwin and one of her three Children ended up finding their way from Oyster Bay to boston Harbor On Long Island.
She is remembered as the cultured, once socially prominent woman who in 1923 was evicted from the Beekman estate near Oyster Bay.
She lived there for 18 months with their Children and was later fined for refusing to send them to school.
Mrs Winsor next attracted attention when she took up residence on a fishing boat.
The king Philip in boston at the beginning of the depression,
finding it too small, she moved in 1930 into an old four masted schooner, the Snetind then docked at Federal Wharf on Border Street in East boston with her, she took a giant police dog.
Mrs Winsor furnished the schooner into an attractive modern home, One that was destined to be talked about along the entire New England coast for the next 15 years.

[24:52] It was her plan, she said, to teach basket weaving and other handicrafts to mothers and Children who had come to live on the vessel In October 1931. mrs Winsor brought trespass charges against the caretaker of Federal Wharf.
She had taken underprivileged Children aboard and furnished them with meals.

[25:12] By the time. An Winsor Sherwin arrived in Boston in the late 1920s only her youngest child William accompanied her.
A note in the January 26, 1936, Boston Herald explains where Sylvia and Daphne ended up.
There are two other Children, Sylvia, who was prominent socially on Long Island, and another daughter, mrs Phillip, jury foster of new york, who at one time appeared in boston in the play Elizabeth, the queen.

[25:43] If the king Philip was too small for an William and their dog.
What exactly was this ship? This net, in that they were moving on to Named after a mountain peak in Norway. The Stanton was built in Seattle for the American Motor Schooner Company in 1918 and soon found her way to the east coast.
A retrospective in the February 15, 1959.
Patriot ledger notes, Built by the J. H. Price Shipbuilding Corporation, she was a heavily constructed vessel of 1470 gross tons 234 ft long, designed primarily for the or trade.
Earlier listings creditor with being an auxiliary sailor however, in her later years, she certainly had no engine, just relying on our canvas for motive power, In case you didn’t catch that.
The sweetened originally had a diesel engine, but it was removed likely during the 1920 overhaul and she later only used wind power.

[26:45] The article continues compared with east coast schooners. The Stetson could not be called beautiful.
Her head section appeared over large being chopped off short, just forward of the format. Shrouds.
Her poop seemed to be particularly high, making a steep uphill walk from the main deck to the wheel aft balls on. She was very be me, with very little in the way of flair.
Her maximum beam was slightly more than 45 ft.
However, she was well rigged with four heavy masts, top mast, spouse Spirit, and a Djibouti, as a young vessel who was owned by the Micro Navigation Corporation.
Her days in pacific waters were very limited, and before she was a year old she had turned up in mobile Alabama for such a massive and sturdily built ship.
The statins. Sailing career was surprisingly short a decade after her keel was laid down in Seattle a series of misadventures along the east coast led to the end of the Stantons. Oceangoing career.

[27:52] The first Boston heard about the Troubles was in a brief note in the Boston Herald. In 1928, Provincetown, january 7th.
The four masted schooner smitten, which was leaking and drifting dangerously near peaked hill bars at daybreak was towed here tonight by the Coast guard cutter Tampa.
The schooner carrying coal from Norfolk was boston bound, but only to the thick weather and snow. It was decided not to tour to boston.

[28:22] The ill fated vessels. Final voyage had actually begun weeks earlier and 500 miles to the southwest, in the bustling port of Norfolk Virginia as the February 23, 1928 edition of the Boston Globe, described,
after a passage filled with thrills for its crew, the four masted wooden schooner Smitten, commanded by Captain Gray of Everette, was towed into port this morning Three months ago.
The vessel, Laden with 2200 tons of coal, left Norfolk for Bangor on a passage that was destined to be the most nerve wracking.

[28:56] Left Norfolk for Bangor on a passage that was destined to be the most nerve wracking or captain had ever experienced.
The craft ran into a fierce gale. After passing the Virginia Capes and the terrific pounding she received became partially dismasted.
It was picked up and towed back to Hampton roads.
She was delayed six weeks for repairs, and when she finally resumed her passage, severe weather was again experienced, which drove her to shelter in a nearby harbor.
The coal, which had been in the hold for three months, showed signs of heating after the schooner sailed again, and on monday last she put into Provincetown, where it was discovered that the cargo in the after part of the hold was ablaze,
The USS one bank, and the tug Wellfleet pumped water into the vessel, and apparently the flames were extinguished.
The passage to Bangor was abandoned, and the Wellfleet told the schooner to boston when the cargo is unloaded, the full extent of the damage will be determined.

[29:59] It probably goes without saying, but when 2000 tons of coal catches fire in the hold of a wooden ship, well, it can cause a few problems.
A 1959 Patriot ledger article about this net and catalogs the damage that caused the ship’s owners to simply walk away.
Two days later the schooner was at her boston birth. The still hot cold being discharged.
Then it was seen that great damage had been done.
The base of one of the masts had burned right away, only the deck in the stays holding up the Spar.
Later a cement block was placed under it to keep it in place.
The under part of the deck was badly charged and structurally she was considerably weakened, her owners, feeling that she was not worth repairing at that time, left her tied up to a wharf in East boston.

[30:53] The Stetson was mostly forgotten after that 1928 fire, And by sometime in early 1930.
And Winsor Sherwin and her family had given up on the fishing Trawler King Philip and made a new home on the abandoned schooner.

[31:07] About the many families who are weathering the depression on houseboats gives us a little more information about an in William’s life after setting up a home on the Snetind mrs Winsor and her son, William have the four masted schooner straightened all of themselves.
The sweetened Norwegian for Snow Peak has long been out of commission, and it’s tied up to the Federal wharf in east boston.
It is a massive, eerie place, and the wind whistles through the rigging and the most approved manner of romance, sirs.
After gingerly ascending another of these gangplanks to the deck, you walk about half a block before you come to Mrs Winsor’s front door.
That is to say, you go down aft and climb the ladder to the poop deck, where battered wicker chairs give evidence of summer relaxation.
A bell cord hangs from a newly bored hole beside the companion way leading to the officer’s quarters Mrs Winsor and her son picked the master’s cabin and three other rooms to live in, But they have 14 spare rooms.
Besides that is well finished rooms of adequate size that isn’t counting the crew’s quarters in the for castle and vast spaces below decks that even William hasn’t had time to explore completely.
Squash cord. A football field or a half mile racetrack would be lost in the place.

[32:30] One room is devoted to a shop where toys are made. Mrs Winsor is an interior decorator and a handicraft artist.
Her original purpose in taking the boat was to found a resident school for the making of salable objects.
The schooner was to have been towed to Marblehead, but there were difficulties, and the windsors have lived on her for the past three years.

[32:53] A lot of these profiles essentially turn and William into caricatures with and portrayed as fiercely independent, defiant and borderline, crazy.

[33:04] William, on the other hand, is treated as a sheltered young man possessing child like innocence.
As seen in this article in the January 28, 1936 globe William, who was 23, said he attended Derby Academy and hang them until three years ago.
He has never worked for anyone except his mother and his knowledge of the world.
It’s wicked way seems to be limited despite that he’s a bright chap with a ready laugh while he may never have worked for wages, helping his mother carried its own share of mortal risks.
Even before the family home was towed out into the middle of boston harbor and left there.
There were times when quick and decisive action was needed. Even at Federal Wharf, as described in the December 27, 1933, Boston Herald,
the 39 year old steam ship, the City of Bangor out of commission for seven years, sank it, or dock at Federal Worf East boston last night,
when the weight of the snow on her broad decks tipped her over and the side seams allowed the harbor waters to fill her hold in sinking.
However, the City of Bangor nearly pulled over the four masted lumber schooner smitten, to which she was tied by 10 lines,
seven of the lines snapped when the steamer began sinking, and mrs ann Winsor and her son William Winsor who live aboard the schooner cut the remaining three houses when the schooner began to keel.

[34:31] After the snowden was moored off Thompson island, with no way for the family on board to get to shore.
The outlook seemed bleak for the sugar ones, however, as they battened down the hatches and prepared for the worst of winter, they got unexpectedly good news from the legal owners of their home.
On January 28, 1936, the Boston Herald reported on this sudden change of fortune.
A sudden turn of events indicated the owners became convinced it would be cheaper to let the Sherwin is have the 18 year old wooden schooner than to break it up and sink it.
It was intimated the owners realized yesterday that as long as the Sherwin were serious and their attentions to remain aboard the schooner, they might as well act as keepers for the status saving Gorman and this company.
The expensive hired keepers, someone must remain aboard the schooner if it’s to be kept at anchor in the harbor.
There’s no value in the schooner, according to the unanimous agreement of marine experts, it would cost considerable to cut the masts, and otherwise prepare the craft for illegal sinking.
In view of this. Why chase the Sherwin Zoff, and make necessary the hiring of keepers or the destruction of the schooner.

[35:45] The winner of 1936 must have been an emotional roller coaster for William and Ann Winsor Sherwin with the globe reporting on a vicious storm that lashed the Snetind on the day after the rumor that the owner would sign the ship over to an,
seems opening wider with every pounding wave a lee shore lurking close aboard, the four masted schooner still rode at anchor off Thompson island down the harbor last night, and her embattled occupants misses.
An W. Sherwin her son William, and a dog seemed to be victorious in their fight to remain on board.

[36:20] Weary of the struggle to remove the Sherwin ends, representatives of the Montgomery Navigation Company were ready to call the whole thing off, Give Mrs Sherwin a Bill of Sale and drop the matter.
Mrs Sherwin maintained her threat that she would go down with the ship rather than leave Mxnet and lashed by running sees and creaking in every joint was definitely getting the worst of the bargain.
Last night her mast seemed ready to give way under weakening shrouds her anchor cable dragged her seems open constantly.
A good wind out of the northeast would have no difficulty in piling her ashore on Thompson island.

[37:01] Perhaps the reality of the situation began to sink in with the Montgomery Corporation after that first storm.
Or maybe they’re lawyers just started worrying about what sort of exposure they would have if the family was exposed to the full fury of a new England winter at sea on a disabled ship, that the Company had turned over title to Either way.
The globe reported on their second thoughts on February 4, 1936.
Stories have been in circulation to the effect that the company was willing to give mrs Sherwin a Bill of Sale for the schooner.
But Attorney Ryan said this afternoon that the company will not give her a bill of sale unless she has an Anchorage in a place of security and safety for taking care of the vessel.
It would do us no good to give a bill of sale for a 270 ft schooner to a woman who has no facilities to handle it, said attorney Ryan.
If she had an Anchorage for it, that would be a different proposition. We would not have disturbed her in the first place unless we have received orders from the court to remove the schooner.
We’re not gonna do anything that will render ourselves liable to her or anyone else.

[38:08] No matter who owned the schooner. The Sherwin Czar in no hurry to leave her after being towed out into the harbor that winter they showed no signs of leaving even after being hit with storm after storm.
They even risked being swept out to sea during a February storm that ended up grounding this net. And as the globe reported on February 19, 1936 the Senate and weathered the heavy storm of last week.
But with the change in the wind, her anchor chain snapped, and for the past three days she had been locked in an ice floe a half mile northwest of Thompson’s Island for weeks.
The schooner was an anchor between spectacle and Thompson’s island, but the storm pushed her through the ice packs to a position between Thompson’s and Castle Island.
Last night the wind freed her from the ice where she had been locked, and headed her like a derelict. Out to sea, spectacle halted their progress.
Stern first she slid onto the beach at the southwest corner of the island, ringing of the ship’s bell first attracted the attention of residents in the island, and they rushed out to find the schooner tossed by the gale smashing towards shore.
Mrs royalty. Wyatt, wife of the caretaker, said that there wasn’t much water under the schooner, and she doesn’t believe that it can be floated.

[39:29] She also heard the ringing of the bell and said that Mrs Sherwin was screaming something from the schooner.
Others said that Mrs Sherwin wanted to know how much water was under the schooner. The water is particularly shallow. At the point where the schooner struck.

[39:44] In the 1956 globe retrospective, a spectacle island resident recalled the night when the wind drove the giant ship into the shallows on the island’s western shore.
Ray E. Wyatt, caretaker on the island described it this way she came smack dab up on the beach, and this woman was ringing the bell like a house of fire.
We all ran down to where she struck and she and the boy were a stern rang the bell and yelling to know how much water they had underneath.
Lady Wyatt yelled back, You haven’t got enough water under that ship to make a cup of tea.

[40:22] Having lost her anchor and been driven ashore by a winter storm, some people would have taken this opportunity to abandon ship, but not an Winsor Sherwin as we’ve already seen. She was nothing if not stubborn.
And on February 20, 1936, the globe reported that she was ready to make the tidal flats just yards from the city’s most disgusting waste processing plant.
Her new home, harder ground close by the disposal plant where the city’s rubbish and refuse is burned.
The wreck that once was the smart four masted schooner Snetind rested only a few yards from the shore of Spectacle Island last night, apparently settled there for a long time to come.

[41:04] Mrs N. Winsor Sherwin Her 22 year old son William and their dog arlo are as firmly settled in their cluttered quarters aft.
They won’t give up the ship any more now than they would before the vessel dragged from her Anchorage off Thompson’s island.
Late Tuesday the boston herald’s version of the story added mrs Sherwin last night refused an offer the Coast Guard to take her ashore.
The Sherwin czar in no danger, it was said, and the schooner probably can be refloated tomorrow at high tide by the next day.
That confident prediction that the Senate and would float again on the next high tide was a distant memory with the globe reporting The Senate and is firmly embedded in the sand about 100 ft from the high tide mark.
Unless a gale comes out of the Northeast, she doubtless will remain where she is until she eventually breaks up for no toe seams in the office.
The woman occupant of the schooner misses an Winsor Sherwin says that she has no money for a tow, and besides, there is no place for the schooner is welcome,
And was quoted in the February 7, 1956 Boston Globe Retrospective describing what it was like to look out on the ice around our floating home, even after it was no longer really floating.

[42:26] They can have all their hotels.
I prefer my private flop with its mystically lovely vista of shimmering ice in which the statin is frozen solidly to the modernity of Pent up City Pens.

[42:40] Despite the early reporting saying that the statement was permanently buried in the sand, a spectacle island, A storm about a week later floated her again, albeit briefly,
february 28th 1936 story in the globe described how the storms that are drifting again,
no matter from what quarter the next gale over boston Harbor, will probably settle the fate of the four masted schooner smitten,
Drift ice, moving in a great field out into the harbour, pulled her away from the beach of Spectacle Island yesterday and left her at an uneasy anchor about 200 ft offshore.
She is at the mercy of the wind even more now than during her Anchorage off Thompson’s island.

[43:24] The Herald, also reported on the storm’s effect on this net end, on February 27, 1936,
released from what well might have been its last resting place on the beach of Spectacle Island, in the lower harbor, by the movement of heavy ice, tide and wind.
The four masted schooner Snetind was found this morning to be about 100 yards from its previous position aboard this net end our misses, an Winsor Sherwin and her son William, who refused to give up the ship.
The vessel is now close to the channel between Thompson’s and spectacle islands, where storms will find it a ready target, in the opinion of Mariners.

[44:04] Despite these dire predictions, this net and was driven back onto the sand just offshore from Spectacle Island by the shifting wind, and here the schooner would stay for over a decade to come.

[44:16] The Sherwin ins, though isolated, seem to be more or less safe on board. Their hard won home With an editorial note in the February 20, 1936 globe, focusing on the more romantic aspects of their play.

[44:31] Mrs Sherwin skipper of the schooner sweetened, has been marooned, has stood off invaders, has gone adrift and been shipwrecked all without leaving the harbor.

[44:44] There’s a passage in recent podcast, Guest Pablo shim Covas book Urban Archipelago.
That helps explain why early 20th century Bostonians were primed to see the harbor islands as a place of wilderness and romance, where a hermit like an Winsor Sherwin was not at all out of place.

[45:02] The harbor islands were presented as picturesque and form. And if people do it all then only sparsely and with maverick characters who added to rather than detracted from the island’s romantic charm,
The globe reporters who in 1900 made a trip to the outer islands, described in great detail their encounter with one of these curious Islanders, the lobsterman James turner, the emperor of Calf Island,
Turner who had by then lived on the island for 46 years having for company only his wife and his Newfoundland dog.
Prince was the son of another longtime islander who became notorious for scaring off with a shotgun in hand boston boating parties that made the mistake of landing on his island.

[45:48] Grape Island in Hingham Bay was home to another harbor hermit, generally known as Captain smith, who, according to a popular account, was just as likely to treat visitors to stories of his youth on board a slave ship as to greet them with shots from his musket upon arrival.
While such behavior would have been entirely out of place on the mainland, it seemed only fitting in the small, isolated world of the harbor archipelago.
The island seemed to exist in a slightly different reality than that of the mainland.
More adventurous and exotic one attracting characters who seemed has fallen out of time as the islands themselves.
That’s exactly how the newspapers treated the Sherwin during their harbor island Hermitage as exotic characters who existed in a slightly different reality than mainland Boston less than two miles away.
City authorities in the U. S. Coast Guard, however, viewed the Sherwin very differently as a nuisance.
The newspapers would report how self reliant the Sherwin is were planting flowers and vegetables on the ample decks of the State and gathering rainwater and scavenging or fishing for whatever support the C could provide.

[46:59] What they didn’t report was how reliant the Sherwin ins maroon miles offshore without a working boat.
We’re on the Coast Guard and the Harbor Police to ferry them back and forth between their schooner home and the city that was otherwise just out of reach.
At first these agencies tended to indulge them, such as when a series of signal flags were hung out on the rigging of the Senate.
And as reported in the Boston Post on February 5, 1936 When a strange signal was displayed from the shrouds of the four masted schooner sweetened.
Late yesterday afternoon the Coast Guard Patrol boat, Harriet Lane went to the assistance of mrs Ann Winsor Sherwin and brought her assure that she might be treated by a physician for an abscessed year.
It was her first trip ashore in 11 days, but she remained ashore only a short time, fearing the Staten might be seized and she was returned to the Schooner by the Coast Guard last night.

[47:55] The relationship between the Sherwin and the Coast Guard quickly soured On February 16, 1936. The Boston Herald reported how an almost immediately began relying on the garbage scouts that plied the route between Spectacle Island and Boston Daily.
As we learned from Pavlyuchenkova in episode 239, these were no longer the Barney dumping boats that dump Boston’s garbage out in the outer harbor and hopes that it would float away.
These barges were headed to the large and growing landfill. There was the only remaining business on Spectacle Island after the Garbage incinerator ceased operation in 1935.
Mrs An Winsor Sherwin rode proudly down the harbor in a garbage scow last night to rejoin her 23 year old son aboard their home for five years.
The creaking schooner smitten mrs Sherwin came Ashore four days ago for dental treats have been stranded on land ever since because the Coast Guard refused to give her ferry service,
officials of a disposal company said last night that the scow made a special trip to accommodate the woman.

[49:01] Soon enough, the Harbor police joined the Coast Guard and refusing service to the Sherwin ones.
After all, nobody likes being taken advantage of An article in the March 11, Globe notes, the hospitality that Boston extended to young William Sherwin when he needed to come ashore to see a dentist.
About a month after his mother’s own trip to the dentist Williams Sherwin who lives with his mother on the four masted schooner straightened off spectacle Island, spent the night at the City prison last night,
after police refused to make the harbor boat a Jitney Service.
Young Sherwin appeared at police headquarters at 10 30 PM and told Lieutenant Edward J. Keating that he had come ashore yesterday morning on the barge of the Coleman disposal company so that he could visit a dentist.
He asked if the harbor police would take him out to Spectacle Island, but Lieutenant keating told him that the police didn’t intend to have their boat used for a ferry.
Lieutenant keating told young Sherwin that he could sleep at the city prison and be awakened this morning and time to get one of the Coleman boats at kelly’s landing in South boston.

[50:09] I suppose that’s better than nothing but a prison caught in a garbage barge. Aren’t exactly the red carpet.
Still after a while, the police soften their position.
Eventually, the Sherwin and the stuntmen would become a sort of modern day folk tale marveled at by sailors on their way in and out of modern boston for now the family was at least becoming tolerated.
The November 25, 1937, Boston Herald reported how the harbour police made sure that the Sherwin would have an appropriate thanksgiving dinner to go along with whatever they could grow on deck or scavenged from the surrounding waters.

[50:48] Mrs an Winsor Sherwin and her son William who lived on the old schooner Snetind beached off spectacle island in boston harbor, we’ll have a happy thanksgiving today. Thanks to boston’s harbor police.
Late yesterday, the police boat eu Curtis loaded with two baskets of chicken and food went out to the four master,
patrolman, Daniel, Doyle James, kerrigan, William, healey, fred Collins and William Brown collected the goods from their brother harbor policemen.

[51:18] The growing familiarity between the police and the Sherwin family cut both ways with boston police using their knowledge of the family’s living situation to continue the crusade to have them evicted.

[51:30] The Boston Globe reported on December 18, 1937.
The police officers that are reported the Sherwin to the Health dept with the intent of having them removed from the schooner before they weathered the brunt of another new England winter at sea to boston, Health Department Inspectors and Lieutenant Lawrence H.
Don, acting captain of the Harbor police, will board the abandoned schooner Snetind this morning to see whether mrs Ann Winsor Sherwin and her son William. We’re living amid unsanitary conditions.
A search warrant to go aboard. The vessel was granted to Inspector Francis L. Donovan yesterday by Judge Charles J. Brown in East boston District Court.
It has been revealed that Lieutenant Don has been paying for range oil out of his own pocket, so that she and her son might keep warm during the cold weather.
Health authorities claim that the after living quarters of the pair are only two ft above water at high tide.

[52:25] The first attempt to serve the family with the search warrant had to be called off due to Foul weather.
But interestingly the December 19, 1937 Herald reported that an used the same storm was covered a sneak into town and lay in enough provisions to wait out any upcoming attempts to a victor.
While police and health authorities were laying plans to force misses an Winsor Sherwin and her son William to give up their good ships natan off spectacle Island. Yesterday, Mrs Sherwin suddenly appeared in boston on a shopping expedition.
She visited grocery establishments and laid in a large supply of provisions apparently enough to withstand a long siege.
Police learned over sortie ashore when a grocery firm asked the Police Harbor Patrol to assist in making delivery.
What puzzled authorities the most was the question of how Mrs Sherwin got off the ship, from which police have vainly tried to dislodge her.
No one knew she was away until she appeared in town Yesterday, police and health authorities were laying plans to dislodge er on grounds that continued residents aboard constituted a health menace.
Yesterday, police in the Harbor patrol boats started with two Health department inspectors for the Snetind but they only got as far as city point when heavy fog forced them to turn back,
accordingly, all operations accordingly, all operations against the Snetind were postponed.

[53:53] About a week later. A second attempt was made.
The City Health Commissioner boarded this net and with the help of the police and examined the living quarters In the end, though, the Sherwin emerged victorious as reported in the Herald on December 27, 1937.
Mrs an Winsor Sherwin and her son William have won their latest fight to retain their home on the water logged four masted schooner Snetind which is lying stranded off spectacle island in the lower harbor dr Henry fr Watts boston.
Health Commissioner announced today that after examining a report filed by two inspectors of his department who checked on the conditions aboard the old schooner.
Following a harbor police complaint, he had found that the mode of living of mrs Sherwin and her son was not endangering the health of the public and that therefore his department had no jurisdiction in the matter.

[54:48] Note that the health commissioner claimed that he didn’t have jurisdiction because there wasn’t a public health concern, not because he didn’t have jurisdiction over a vessel that was moored offshore.
Even a spectacle island itself is administratively part of the city of boston.
I would think that there’d be some doubt over whether a ship moored or grounded in this case offshore would fall into the same jurisdiction.
Indeed, that was the position the police took. A month later. The boston post reported on their annual census of Bostonians on behalf of the Election Department.
Mrs an Winsor Sherwin and her son William, 25 who have remained on the schooner Snetind in boston harbor for months in spite of the police and bad weather were ignored in the police listing of boston voters.
They’re like wrecked sailors. They have no status, said Lieutenant Lawrence, a done commander of the Harbor Police, whose officers listed 14 residents on spectacle Island but passed up the grounded schooner.

[55:50] After the failure of the final attempt by the police and the Health Department to evict the Sherwin wins the family and their schooner tended to fall off the front pages.
The December 24, 1938 Herald noted that Ann and William were given a traditional Christmas dinner and the coverage over the next few years tended to be similar human interest pieces.
The christmas Eve story said one patrol boat was assigned according to custom to take a christmas dinner to an Winsor the eccentric old lady who lives aboard this net and on spectacle island,
She was the mcshane playing the role of waterborne santa, claus, delivering turkey, trinkets and fuel to the lonely lady.

[56:35] In the run up to World War Two boston’s waterfront swelled with newly enlisted or conscripted sailors.
The Charlestown Navy Yard was booming and ships were under construction from there to the south boston naval annex to Quantum point to the fore river shipyard and beyond.
The sudden increase in harbor traffic coincided with a resurgence of interest in the antique four masted schooner. That these sailors passed every day on their way in and out of the harbor.

[57:05] On January 31, 1943, the Boston Herald reported on the Sherwin continued Hermitage on the sentence,
Which, despite all predictions that she would be torn apart by the surf, were blown out to sea by the wind, was still grounded in the sand off Spectacle Island.
Having even weathered the great 1938 New England hurricane, with the article saying,
The 15 year battle to keep the Schooner, which she declared last night would have been impossible, but for the kindness of the police and city officials, has been in and out of the courts.
The ships survived the hurricane, even sheltered by the cliff at spectacle Island, proximity of the city disposal station has made it far from a desirable place of abode.
The schooner is an object of amazed interest to the servicemen whose duties take them down the harbor.
The schooner, while a ground and far from being tight, is kept afloat by hand pumps and ingenious devices, which Sherwin had designed his mother says.

[58:06] A few months before this article ran and left William in charge and departed to spend time in new york recovering from an illness While William held down the fort on the land.
In the meantime, Williams selective service number had come up and since his last formal legal residents have been in new york before his parents separated.
That’s where his draft notice was delivered now and was back in boston, trying desperately to get the notice to William before he was accused of dodging the draft.
Unfortunately, as reported in the January 31, 1943, Boston Globe, the Coast Guard in the Boston Harbor Police still remembered how the Sherwin had treated them like a taxi service during that first year on Spectacle Island.

[58:53] Mrs Sherwin has not been issued a Coast Guard identification pass and cannot travel in boston harbor.
Yesterday afternoon, she appealed to the police, the Coast Guard and the towboat captains, but none honored her request.
Mrs Sherwin made front page headlines in 1936, when distress flags fluttered from the Master Direct Schooner, All business and busy boston harbor was halted as ship’s hurried to answer the distress call.
Mrs Sherwin appeared on deck and declared that her son was suffering from a painful toothache, and that it would be nice if he could be taken ashore for treatment.
Such incidents as this have strained relations between the Sherwin and the harbor police to the breaking point and last night’s events haven’t improved them all.
This seems inconsequential to mrs Sherwin Who’s wondering how the draft board will feel about the matter tomorrow morning.

[59:47] That same day, the herald elaborated on William’s experience with the draft board so far and Ann’s difficulties in reaching them.

[59:56] William W. Sherwin 30 for the hermit of Boston Harbor, who has spent 14 months alone on the Schooner, sweetened at Spectacle Island is going in the army or the Navy tomorrow, but he doesn’t know it yet.
His mother, Mrs Ann W. Sherwin came over from new york with his draft induction order. Traveling through the blizzard with the important documents.

[1:00:19] The difficulties of communication with the statin because of its isolation in the harbor has created a problem for the selective service, and on occasion has caused Sherwin to be listed as a delinquent,
but he was perfectly willing to serve and has always been on hand, his mother declared, and we’ll be glad to go to the induction station tomorrow.
He came ashore a month ago and passed the preliminary medical exam and has been waiting for his notice, but the only way the authorities have of communicating with them is by sending a boat out to the schooner.
Mrs Sherwin arrived from new york too late to get out to the schooner yesterday, but she spent hours waiting and hoping to get there in time to give him the notice and to see him before he leaves for the service.
Sherwin is due to report at the East boston draft board at 6 30 monday morning to go with the quota from that board to the commonwealth Avenue, Joint Army and Navy induction station.
His order called for his induction into either the army or the Navy, and he won’t know for which he has selected until after his physical examination.
Mrs Sherwin was ill for three months in New York. she rallied when the draft notice came and packed her baggage to return to the schooner.
The busses did not run in the blizzard, she said, and she had a long wait to get a train.

[1:01:38] The harbor police on orders from above eventually relented and agreed to take and to the Snowden that evening.
Then they turned around and brought William back to shore. He was met with a scrum of reporters who wanted to know what branch of the service he hoped to be drafted into and what his plans were.
As we see in the February 1, 1943 edition of the Boston Globe.
William Winsor Sherwin who’s been living alone aboard the wrecked Schooner.
Smitten on Spectacle Island for the past 14 months will keep his date today with the local draft board 12 of East Boston last night.
William jaunty in a newly pressed suit and faded chesterfield code declared he didn’t see any reason why he shouldn’t like the army before he hurried off to spend the night at the seaman’s home.
After all That date is for 6:30 this morning.

[1:02:32] William was drafted into the Army, rising to the rank of technician 5th grade equivalent to a corporal.
He was honorably discharged in March of 1946. Neither he nor his mother continued their residents on the set, and after he was drafted.
Once it was abandoned, the Schooner became a frequent target for Vandals and souvenir hunters like the four men who the Boston Globe reported were arrested on the ship on August 28, 1944.

[1:03:01] Three Somerville residents in a Bill Ryka man arrested by Harvard police today aboard the beach schooner Smitten on Spectacle Island appeared before Judge Charles J.
Brown in the east boston District Court this morning charged with larceny,
Charles Conrad and William carter pleaded not guilty, while Levi James and William carter, possibly a misprinted name, pleaded guilty,
according to the police officers, Charles smith and William Norton were cruising in the harbor when they found a motorboat tied alongside the schooner, the property of mrs Ann Winsor Sherwin,
investigation revealed that they were picking up articles on board and preparing to transfer them to the motorboat.
The men said that they were returning from a fishing trip.

[1:03:49] In this description. In the September 1, 1947 Boston Globe, it sounds like curious souvenir hunters may have been responsible for the fire that broke out on the schooner that day.

[1:04:00] The sweetened aground off Spectacle Island since 1936 when it was towed from its mooring place at Federal Wharf with mrs Sherwin and her son William aboard was the scene of a blaze witnessed for miles along the south shore until extinguished by a fireboat.
The flames were discovered by mr and mrs john timmons living at the spectacle Island, home of Timmins father, a foreman for a disposal company on the island.
They were sitting on the Timmins porch when they saw the stern of the Hulk, a ground 50 yards southwest of the island.
Belch flame and smoke as the fireboat responded. The police patrol boat William H. Mcshane hurried to the scene and warded off curious small craft.
Police Commissioner thomas F Sullivan arrived to supervise police work, although fireman said that the origin of the blaze was undetermined, a clue was provided by George O’Halloran.
A guard at the Deer Island house of correction O’Halloran told police that he was returning from a trip in his cabin cruiser with his wife Emma and two companions yesterday afternoon,
when he spotted a blue cabin cruiser with three men aboard moored along the starboard side of the net.
In O’Halloran saw the three men leaving this net in and returning aboard the cruiser and noticed smoke coming from the deserted hulk as the blue cruiser left her side,
A few minutes later as O’Halloran looked back while proceeding towards the inner harbor, he saw this net and in flames.

[1:05:27] The fire may have been suspicious, but as far as a lot of boston officials were concerned it was not unwelcome.
The New York Times took note of the fire in the city’s reaction.
In an article on August 31, 1947 police firemen and waterfront officials alike were hopeful that it would mean the end of the schooner, which has been a nuisance for the last decade or more.
Late this afternoon, flames were discovered leaping from the hulk.
Yachtsman in the harbor reported having seen a cabin cruiser near the spot a short time before a fireboat was sent to the scene, but no attempt was made to put out the fire.
Firemen stood by to keep away small craft up until three years ago, the vessel was the home of mrs Ann Winsor Sherwin divorced wife of louis h Sherwin new york editor and writer and her son William.
In 1943, William. Sherwin was called in the draft and within the next year, mrs Sherwin gave up the ship and went ashore efforts to find her today were unsuccessful.

[1:06:33] Although it was unclear whether an Winsor Sherwin had a legal ownership stake in this net and her absence In the years after the fire onboard, complicated efforts to finally rid boston harbor of what many people considered an eyesore.

[1:06:48] In the final years of the Sherwin habitation. The Stantons holds becomes so waterlogged and tequila dug so deep into the sand that many people said that the main decks were in danger of being submerged during a storm,
and the cabins where the Sherwin is lived were only a foot or two above a healthy high tie.
The fire left the aft quarter completely burned out, and just a few months after the fire, the masts toppled overboard.
There they remained washed in every direction by the waves and tethered to the ship by miles of rope in the rigging, forming a treacherous defensive web that kept curious boaters of a distance.

[1:07:26] Whether it was the Coast Guard, the City or the harbor commissioners is unclear, but a few years after the fire, somebody decided that time was up for this net.
And As the Boston Post reported on June 9, 1951 a plan was hatched to finally read the harbour of the wreck of the Schooner.

[1:07:45] Preparations are underway after many years to remove the four masted schooner Stetson from a mutt embedded resting place back of Spectacle Island in lower boston harbor.
The revel in contracting company of Lynn was yesterday awarded the contract to clear away what authorities call a Minister navigation.
The vessel will be floated, towed to the dumping grounds four miles east of graves light and broad sound, and allowed to sink.
It took some time to get the hulk ready to meet its fade, Ironically, the Christian Science Monitor of July 5, 1951 points out before they could sink this Newton, the revel in company first have to float her,
And since it had been 23 years since a coal fire had rendered her unseaworthy.
15 years since she ran aground near Spectacle Island, and four years since much of the ship burned floating this net, and was no small task.

[1:08:40] Several times during the past week or so. The records have scheduled the hulk of the schooner Snetind for the last voyage out beyond boston light show where she has to be sunk with many other forgotten ships on the bottom of the bay.
Each time the stubborn Sneddon has seen fit to stay where she is resting on the bottom of spectacle Island, placidly contemplating the boston skyline in the modern shipping which steams in and out of the channel not far away,
with her timbers rotten from long disuse and her side and bottom planking, gaping apart in many places,
the stats and welcome so much of the tied into her dark and sodden holds that the firm undertaking the disposal of her, hasn’t wanted to edge her out into the shipping channel, where she might decide in opportunity to sink on her own and embarrass the harbor traffic.
The revel in construction company of Lynn massachusetts, which is undertaking the disposal assignment for the port of boston wants to make this nut and as watertight as possible before a tug slips a hauser around her deck bits for the last trip down the harbor George way.
Chief engineer for the Port Authority agrees that revel in has got a ticklish job on its hands and trying to coax the massless old hulk out to sea.
The next try is scheduled for July 17 when a very high tide will help to get the reluctant Snetind off the mud.
Finally, on July 21, 1951, the New York Times noted that the monumental task of disposing of Shea Sherwin had been achieved.

[1:10:09] The hulk of the schooner smitten, long known to boston Mariners in the massachusetts courts was towed out to sea today and sunk off boston like,
Army engineers condemned the rotting wooden hull as a minister navigation and assigned a contracting company to tow it from Spectacle Island, where it’s been settling deeply into the mud for 15 years,
Tons of silt were removed and extensive patching was required before the bones of the old four master could be towed away.
The contract called for the vessel to be blown up, burned and sunk the next day. The boston globe filled in some of the details of the scene.
An explosion and a pillar of smoke yesterday marked the end of Boston Harbor’s proud old four masted schooner Smitten and the end of a strange waterfront tail.
Yesterday, on the last voyage, with remnants of a flower bed still apparent on the foredeck the Snetind was carefully towed clear the shipping lanes and experts laid the demolition charges.
She went to the bottom gracefully.

[1:11:13] The patriot ledger reported that the old girl didn’t go easily.
She was weighted down a torch put to her and her seacocks open.
She plunged by the headbutt, her tall stern, the one time home of the Sherwin refused to go under.
More weights had to be attached. And it was not until July 26 that she slid down into the 200 ft of water.

[1:11:37] When she didn’t surface after the 1947 fire or make any claim of ownership before the ship was scuttled. In 1951, rumors begin to swirl that an Winsor Sherwin was dead.
I was gratified to read that she surfaced again just a few years later. Now in the Washington D. C. Suburbs.
And that was even more gratified to read in the Boston Globe article from February 7, 1956, that she was still up to her old tricks.

[1:12:05] She has taken up unauthorized residents in a dilapidated government owned cottage nestled alongside the Chesapeake and Ohio canal just above the Georgetown section of the capital.
The only trouble is herself appropriated. House happens to sit smack in the middle of the right of way to the new George Washington Memorial Parkway, which the National Park Service’s building next to the canal.
From Washington to cabin john Maryland the dilemma facing Uncle Sam and mrs Winsor is this grading on a new section of the George Washington parkway is scheduled to start soon after.
The last of the decaying structures has been cleared from the right away.
A total of 122 mostly abandoned summer cottages and shanties already have been demolished. Only seven remain.
One of the seven is still occupied by mrs Winsor for a year. Now she has resisted all efforts by the Park Service to induce her to leave.
Park officials are stumped. They know they can’t very well bulldoze the four room cottage over with mrs Winsor and her belongings inside.
Whenever she does leave her little home, one or 2 of her friends remain inside the garden.

[1:13:15] Ann’s cottage was probably just outside the Dc city limits on the Maryland side and the extension of the G. W. Parkway is known today as the Clara Barton Parkway.
The Globe article continues Edward.
A Jet National Park Service information officer said at the present, she’s not holding up progress on the roadway, but if she’s still in the house a few months from now we’ll have to take drastic action.
He would not say what that action might be. We of course, are trying to coax her out of the house and show her as much patience as boston authorities did, he said,
I never saw such a stout hearted woman and Winsor pleads her case to whoever will listen.
Two congressmen, newspaper reporters and Interior Department officials.
She begs that my little house be spared and this should be allowed to expand it into a rehab center for disabled war veterans.

[1:14:13] Passersby who exchanged greetings with her along the towpath. Hope that some snug harbor may yet be found for the spirited lady who brought up her family despite hardship,
and who has sought in her declining years to give aid to those less fortunately situated than she.

[1:14:31] William Sherwin died on November 26, 1985. He’s buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
I couldn’t find a record of an Winsor Sherwin is passing By the time she was evicted from her little house in Maryland, she was 74 years old.
She could have easily found some new abandoned property and squatted in it for another 20 years or she could have quietly expired and been buried in a pauper’s grave while their final resting place remains a mystery.
The statement itself provides an appropriate memorial to an Winsor Sherwin An article written for north atlantic dive expeditions details the rediscovery of the wreck.
The wreck was located and researched in the mid 1990s by Eric to Kochi in today this net and known among local divers as the schooner barge can be found upright and largely intact.
The decks have collapsed in most areas, but the whole structure remains solid.
The bow of the wreck has begun to collapse as well. The top of the wreck can be reached in about 170 ft of water with maximum depths to approximately 190 ft.
The wreck is large but relatively straightforward to navigate like many vessels, heavily fished.
This wreck has its fair share of nets and entanglements.
It certainly is one of the more breathtaking rexona day with good visibility.

[1:15:57] To learn more about an Winsor Sherwin in this net and check out this week’s show notes at hub history dot com slash 241.
I’ll have links to many of the globe, articles that I quoted from in the show as well as the Hollywood papers that I referenced in regard to that rat louis Sherwin,
I’ll post pictures of the schooner tied up at federal wharf, anchored off Thompson island and harder grounded spectacle island.
I’ll also include pictures of Ann and William Sherwin So you can picture our protagonists.

[1:16:30] I owe a special debt of thanks to Pavlyuchenkova. This week After interviewing her for episode 239, I asked her about the picture of this net and on page 89 of her book and whether she knew the story of an wins or Sherwin,
She replied that she did that an early draft made.
The Sherwin is a major focus of her book, but as it was revised, they ended up getting cut out of it entirely.
However, she had accumulated a lot of material about the Sherwin and the buttons which she offered to share with me.
So pretty much any reference to a period newspaper other than the Globe is thanks to dr Pavlov. Simca, thank you very much for the assistance Papua.

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Music

Jake:
[1:17:57] That’s all for now. Stay safe out there listeners.