THE RETURN OF THE WINDJAMMER.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3220, 19 May 1924, Page 8

THE RETURN OF THE WINDJAMMER.

(By C. Fox Smith.) “Blow, bullies, blow, For Californ-i-o” So runs the old chantey chorus which has been volleyed forth by the crew of many a Cape Horner since the American clipper with their hard-case skippers and their bucko mates came roaring to the Golden Gate in the days of the ’49 gold rush, down to the time when the ’Frisco grain fleet gathered, together last of the splendor of sail.

It seemed a little while ago as if that song had been heard for tlie last time. And now ’Frisco is to have her windjammers once more —’Frisco, of so many sailing ship associations, whose harbor has been for years all but deserted by the tall beauties of the sea. Mr James D. Rolf, Mayor of that city, and one of its foremost shipping men, is about to inaugurate a service of sailing vessels between California and the Far East. Four ships are to form the nucleus of the venture, the number to be increased should it prove successful. Of these, one is a new wooden barquentine built in America during the war, such as has been a familiar sight in the Port of London just lately; the others have much more interesting associations. The Annie M, Reid was formerly the Howard D. Troop. By all accounts she was just such a tough ship as her name would lead an experienced old shellback to expect. But she could sail! She once made the passage from Sydney to Falmouth with grain in 82 days —and grain, be it remembered, is a very different proposition from the wool with which.most of the crack passages from Australia were made.

Ihe James Rolph was originally the British full-rigged ship Celtic 'Monarch, built by Roy den, of Liverpool, for Messrs Hugh Jones and Co., of that city, and, although she was never in the clipper class—she was built too late lor that—she was a good example of the fine steel and iron barques and full riggers which the last 20 years of last century produced in considerable numbers.

She was laid up at ’Frisco before the war, but the scarcity of tonnage and high freights combined to send her to sea again. The slump laid her up once more, and now she is yet again to 'come out of her retirement a.s part of the new fleet of windjammers. The third of the trio, the Golden Gate, is also an ex-British ship; old sailors will remember her a.s the Lord Shaftesbury, under which name she has loaded grain in days gone hv at the port whence she is now to sail as the Golden Gate.