This is a scratch-built, lapstrake plank-on-frame model of a 1930's-era wooden Pitcairn Island longboat, used by the islanders to meet ships that visited the island with supplies. The wooden boats built on the island at the time were based on a British lifeboat given to Pitcairn Island by Queen Victoria but were modified to allow greater stability during launches into the heavy surf constantly pounding the island. The figures on the boat were constructed by the modeler from epoxy clay over copper wire armatures and were meant to depict both the clothing and people of early 20th Pitcairn as shown in photographs of the period, and the drama of a launch into the surf. Sample items of cargo - mail bags, oil drums, crates - are stored under the thwarts, and a mast and sail are stowed on board in case they were needed. The base, keel, oars, rudder, and thwarts were made from Miro wood supplied to the modeler by a descendent of Fletcher Christian who still lives on the island. The model now resides in the Pitcairn Islands Study Center at Pacific Union College in Angwin, CA.
James Norton
Maine, USA
James Norton
Maine, USA
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