The Great Republic 1:48

[rwiederrich]

Rob,
This is one of the nicer sailing cards I've seen. However, her mizzen is larger than her foremast which is inaccurate. That's just typical for advertising of the day.

True...but the number of sails per yard is the important part.
She even has her full weather deck railing.......
Just adding up the clues.

Rob

 

[ClipperFan]

True...but the number of sails per yard is the important part.
She even has her full weather deck railing.......
Just adding up the clues.

Rob

Rob,
I'm sharing this lighter JE Buttersworth piece not to stir up any more controversy. If you look closely at the white rails which do run the entire deck, with exception of the black iron section at the fore, it looks like the artist has portrayed screen mesh between them. It makes sense that such a protective system be erected at sea. I believe I've also seen canvas panels strung between stanchions on other ships too. I just felt it was interesting enough to share.

 

[rwiederrich]

For interest sake, here is a B/W image of a painting of GR where she lay after the fire.

 

[ClipperFan]

For interest sake, here is a B/W image of a painting of GR where she lay after the fire.

View attachment 478127

Rob,
I'm familiar with this tragic aftermath image. Descriptions remind viewers that all masts in this rueful scene belong to other vessels. Only a scuttled, burned out sunken hulk of the one leviathan Great Republic remains. NB Palmer and his small group of investors spent the next year resurrecting and rebuilding her. As you've mentioned, her cut-down rig was a mere shadow of herself and she was now a 3 decker ship with traditional topgallant forecastle and aft poop deck. Still, she had a successful career which lasted until 1872 and contemporary photos reveal an impressively long hull with a decent rig. Here's two contemporary photos of her as rebuilt. The 2nd bow forward pic is while she was docked at the Wall Street Ferry Terminal, Brooklyn, NY. It's the left half of a Stereograph Albumen print published by George Stacy ca 1860 from The Library of Congress. Third is the original source.
Meanwhile, I just discovered this original 1853 book from Eastman press, written by Duncan McLean, 24 pages, 6 large fold-out plans, retailing for $1,500.00 at Ten Pound Island Book Co. It's now confirmed that Donald McKay did in fact plan on having a controversial forema skysail and if you look closely it's blurrynever in place but I can just see a thin splash rail at the bow. More than likely, this extra yard wasn't rigged when she first arrived at New York. Her fiery demise meant it was never rigged. Effectively this means both Interpretations are correct: from the Gleason's Piictorial illustration, clearly drawn on scene, only her mainmast skysail was rigged while this official 1853 sail plan, Buttersworth oil and Currier litho all show, had she survived she would have had a foremast skysail too. Here's a link to the entire advertisement:

https://tenpound.com/bookmans-log/b...by-donald-mckay-and-commanded-by-capt-l-mckay

 

[rwiederrich]

I have a reprint of that book by Duncan McLean...minus the drawings. I have no doubt McKay intended to install the skysails....but as she was viewed in NY prior to her demise, evidence shows she possibly only retained her main skysail......and possibly not...evidenced by other conflicting accounts.
Irregardless....it doesn't really matter anyway. Like so many models...they can be modeled in many states of development of the vessel.
McCann does a good job in his plans of the Great Republic.....dispight some minor errors. but as we are learning...who is always right, on every aspect...anyway?

I also have a copy of that stereoscopic card for my own stereoscope collection.

At this very moment, some over achiever is dissecting my build of Glory of the Seas and is most likely finding all manner of errors I built into her.
One issue about GR...paintings show her masts raked...they had zero rake....cept the spanker mast.

Sometimes we are led by our own bias. In some cases that is the only guide we use.

Rob

 

[ClipperFan]

Rob,
I just want to be clear that none of what I've been sharing is meant in any way to denigrate your magnificent fully scratch built Great Republic replica. In fact, more than one reference in the 2nd article shows your work on that impressive ship. If anything I've shared has been offensive, I apologize. As for your magnificent Glory of the Seas miniature, remember Mike's pronouncement that yours is the fiinest model of her he's ever seen. If others want to pick this spectacular ship, I'll remind you of a popular slogan "those who can... do, those who can't.... teach and those who can't do either... criticize."
Norgale,
I thought these Great Republic cross-sections might interest you. To my knowledge, it was the first time McKay made use of criss-cross iron straps to reinforce internal structural strength of this long, long hull. It occured to me that, since you're constructing a 1:48th scale replica, your craft might also benefit from such miniature reinforcements too.

 

[rwiederrich]

Rob,
I just want to be clear that none of what I've been sharing is meant in any way to denigrate your magnificent fully scratch built Great Republic replica. In fact, more than one reference in the 2nd article shows your work on that impressive ship. If anything I've shared has been offensive, I apologize. As for your magnificent Glory of the Seas miniature, remember Mike's pronouncement that yours is the fiinest model of her he's ever seen. If others want to pick this spectacular ship, I'll remind you of a popular slogan "those who can... do, those who can't.... teach and those who can't do either... criticize."
Norgale,
I thought these Great Republic cross-sections might interest you. To my knowledge, it was the first time McKay made use of criss-cross iron straps to reinforce internal structural strength of this long, long hull. It occured to me that, since you're constructing a 1:48th scale replica, your craft might also benefit from such miniature reinforcements too.

View attachment 478359

Rich...nothing you have said I find offensive. If anything, it reinforces the notion that, *Two/More heads are better than one*. Unlike Glory, I had no photographic evidence to balance against what I suspected. I had to derive from what was written to archaic lithographs...and by using several written documents that were found independently of one another...about the subject. It finally boils down to an educated guess....and sometimes those fly in direct opposition to other perpetuated ideas/thoughts.
One thing is for sure...apart from a sail or two...every other detail of the Great republic has been faithfully represented. If I had a couple of side kicks at my disposal at the time........I'd probably faired better.....

Rob

 

[ClipperFan]

Rich...nothing you have said I find offensive. If anything, it reinforces the notion that, *Two/More heads are better than one*. Unlike Glory, I had no photographic evidence to balance against what I suspected. I had to derive from what was written to archaic lithographs...and by using several written documents that were found independently of one another...about the subject. It finally boils down to an educated guess....and sometimes those fly in direct opposition to other perpetuated ideas/thoughts.
One thing is for sure...apart from a sail or two...every other detail of the Great republic has been faithfully represented. If I had a couple of side kicks at my disposal at the time........I'd probably faired better.....

Rob

Rob,
I'll be your Tonto to your Lone Ranger, your Ernie to your Bert, your Costello to your Abbot, your Chong to your Cheech, your Kato to your Green Hornet, your Spock to your Kirk, your Marty McFly to your Doc "Brown", but I draw the line at being Robin to Batman!

 

[rwiederrich]

Rob,
I'll be your Tonto to your Lone Ranger, your Ernie to your Bert, your Costello to your Abbot, your Chong to your Cheech, your Kato to your Green Hornet, your Spock to your Kirk, your Marty McFly to your Doc Emmet Smith but I draw the line at being Robin to Batman!

It’s Doc Brown…….

 

[rwiederrich]

Just for more info. I used these plans to build my GR.

 

[ClipperFan]

It’s Doc Brown…….

Rob,
You're right, of course. As another famous phrase goes "Lord, make my words pleasant and sweet as honey today, for tomorrow I may surely eat them!"

 

[ClipperFan]

Just for more info. I used these plans to build my GR.

View attachment 478470

Rob,
Thank you for sharing your inspirational resource. Courtesy of Google books, I was able to find and download the entire Popular Science series which ran from December 1935 thru April 1936. Probably one of McCann's most in-depth treatment of a single clipper ship topic.

 

[rwiederrich]

Rob,
Thank you for sharing your inspirational resource. Courtesy of Google books, I was able to find and download the entire Popular Science series which ran from December 1935 thru April 1936. Probably one of McCann's most in-depth treatment of a single clipper ship topic.

McCann describes his entire building process in the Popular Science articles. But you have to order the plans separately, to build the model.

Rob

 

[ClipperFan]

McCann describes his entire building process in the Popular Science articles. But you have to order the plans separately, to build the model.

Rob

Rob,
Captn. McCann does a thorough job in his clipper Great Republic build series. Even without ordering separate plans a fairly credible model could be constructed. However, there's an odd discrepancy in his mast layout. Topsail masts are abaft the lower masts. Fortunately you didn't incorporate this error in your magnificent build. Do you have any idea why that is in his sail plan?

 

[rwiederrich]

Yep. She had Forbes double topsails. The reversed doubling is part of that design. However the only part of the Forbes design McKay used was the long doubling with the lower topsail slid up and down on. It was not fixed at the mast cap as was with the Howes design.

Rob

 

[Norgale]

Hi ClipperFan and Rob. Been pretty busy lately with hurricanes so I haven't written any thing to you all for several weeks. So first I'll tell you that all is well where I live and I had no damage to the house or the truck and we made it through all the wind and rain with nothing but a wet shirt to show for it. However the power was off for four days and then off and on (Florida Flash and Flicker) for a couple more days and now, finally, all seems to be back together and working well.
Now to the GR. I'm surprised at all the details you two are haggling about. I have no intention of building a TRUE scale model of the GR. There are way too many sizes of wood to try and copy each one and I'm sure I'll find other things that are just beyond my capabilities. This "Skysail" business is just crazy since nobody today has any idea what Mr. McKay had in mind when he drew his plans. I have already decided that my model will have sky sails on each mast except for the spanker mast so there ya go. Wasn't that simple? Case closed. Ha!
As for the GR plans that ClipperFan posted ,yes they have been a big help all the way so far. They are the plans that I'm using, sent to me by Mr. Crowther many years ago. Since all the writings on the GR do not agree I have made my own decisions because I had to decide what to build at the beginning. Half way trough the model is not the time to change directions. There is no doubt in my mind that some rivet counter will do some measuring of my model somewhere down the line and find many mistakes but by that time I will not be listening to any of his comments. I figure that anyone who is familiar with the GR will be able to identify the model as such and anyone who doesn't figure it out won't know what he's looking at anyway. So I will proceed on my happy way with this model and let the chips fall where they may. Meantime I am enjoying your banter about the rig and the details immensely and learning a lot from both of you. Please, by all means, continue.
Prior to the first hurricane I took a bunch of pictures of all my models and equipment as a record of what I have in the hobby room and some pics are of the present state of the GR. I still have to download the pics so I'll do that right after I finish running my mouth here. Since I ran out of wood again the planksheer has not quite been reached but never fear, the lumber is on it's way and the inside planking is very close to being finished. I have also been collecting things that can be glued into the cargo holds for freight so the bottom deck is not on yet. The deck beams are cut for the second deck up but not glued pending the finishing of the bottom deck. Ya got all that?
Now Rob, you mentioned that the rake of the masts on the GR is "0". All the plans and paintings above show a rake except the top plans and that's the same as throwing a monkey wrench into my gears. So which is it, To rake or not to rake? There is already an 8 degree rake built into the first two decks but it's not too late to change. I will consult my Clipper book by William Crothers and I will appreciate your comments and those of ClipperFan as to just what to do about this.

 

[Norgale]

Here are five more pictures and that's where the shipyard stands at the present time. #36 shows the whole hull with the inside ceiling placed almost to the top. The next few planks will bring me to the planksheer level and that's where all the frames get leveled off and the sheer line established for the rest of the hull.
#37 is looking down into the hull with the second deck beams cut and placed but not glued. Not very straight either it seems.
#38 I tried to get a shot looking along the lower deck but you can only see a small part of it. You can see the height of the ceiling planks though.
#39 is a frame I made to show where the spar deck will fall when I get there. All the frames are cut to the planksheer and the top deckwill be added on piecemeal. That's where the railings have to be built along with a lot of other things for the top deck.
#40 shows where all the planks come together and where the empty places are to be filled. I had to glue in the ceiling so that the top few planks made a complete run from stem to stern with the very top plank forming the base for the planksheer. Lots of spieling with this.

 

[Roger Pellett]

Is your model before or after the fire?

 

[ClipperFan]

Is your model before or after the fire?

Rob,
In his introduction Norgale described Great Republic as the largest wooden ship in the world. No doubt, he's constructing his model based on her as originally launched. Since you know my penchant for accessing reliable historic resources, I'm sharing what I consider to be "The Holy Grail" of Great Republic resources: the entire 24 page 1853 booklet written by Sailor Duncan McLean including all six engraved illustrations accompanying it:

DESCRIPTION of the largest ship in the world, the new clipper GREAT REPUBLIC of Boston, designed, built and owned by DONALD McKAY.

These pages are courtesy of the SOBCO website. Cover is from Eldred's which lists this publication for $1,500.00
I realize the topic of skysails on individual masts has been a somewhat, almost silly "bone of contention." This document will only add fuel to that smoldering fire. While the sail plan shows them installed on fore and main, spar specifications call for skysail yards on fore, main and mizzen! Building her as ultimately planned gives a would-be modeler exact details to accomplish it. Then again, modeling her as she appeared in New York Harbor is another option. Ironically, either choice is accurate.

 

[ClipperFan]

Pages 20-24 complete the entire document. The last page is the SOBCO link to all six engraved illustrations. What I appreciate about this amazing publication is that all deck structures with specific dimensions are apparently given precisely. In all fairness, I haven't read through the entire booklet, so I can't give more specifics until I do. But this is the entire McKay Shipyard publication.