Guy seeks home for a boat that his father started building over 60 years ago......
03-30-2014 | 09:33 AM
#1
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Guy seeks home for a boat that his father started building over 60 years ago......
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/bro...,3448065.story
Sad story, guy is dying and the boat has never gotten wet!
In the days he has remaining, Arthur Ray Brown has but one wish: to find a home for the unfinished wooden sailboat his father lovingly began crafting by hand six decades ago.
"It means a lot to my heart. I'd like to see a good person get it before I go," said Brown, 63, whose life-sapping lung disease has him under 24-hour home hospice care. "I'm at the bottom line now."
Outside Brown's Fort Lauderdale mobile home, propped on stands under blue tarps, rests the 24-foot boat that represents his father's legacy. With its roly-poly custom design, it resembles a child's bath toy, but it's never been in the water. Its blue and white hull, though stained, is constructed of still healthy Dade County pine. It has a brown cabin and mahogany transom, but no engine or mast.
And Brown can't even give it away.
He tried to sell it for $2,500, then kept dropping the price, eventually to $500. No takers. He offered it to schools and the Salvation Army. No interest. He finally put it on Craigslist — no charge. But still the boat remains
"I have dropped the price so much, now I'm saying it's for free," Brown said. "I can't figure out why nobody wants it. You just pay to move it."
In 1953, his father, Frank Brown, an ironworker, began building the ark-like vessel in his Miami backyard. He steamed and bent each plank by hand, planed wood, welded fittings and melted lead on the kitchen stove to pour the keel. For more than 20 years he labored on the boat through nights and weekends, often whistling as he worked.
"It was a dream that he had, to complete this sailboat and put it in the water and go," said daughter Louise Wachstein, 62, of Tampa. "He was always looking at the sky, somewhat like a mariner."
The boat became part of the children's lives. Apart from visits to the beach, it was the closest they ever got to the water. They helped with its construction, bailed out rainwater and cleared it of leaves. Neighbors observed with amusement. "Most of them kind of looked at it like a big joke," Wachstein said. "They would make fun of it and say, 'Noah's Ark.'"
In the mid-'70s, a job-related injury checked Frank Brown's progress on the vessel he sometimes called the Enigma. He was relegated to simple maintenance — painting, sanding, polishing — on the 80 percent completed craft. He and his wife Kay moved to Fort Pierce, along with the boat they still dreamed of one day sailing away in.
But in 1986, while in her backyard, Kay was felled by a heart attack. Thirty-one days later Frank also died. His son Arthur trailered the boat back south, storing it at the Opa-locka powerboat company where he worked, and later at his mobile home. He made sure it was always covered, or sheltered indoors.
"I've kept it for 25 years the best I can. This is as far as I can take it," Brown said.
His daughter, Stephanie Goff, of Hollywood, said her father's landlord has notified all tenants they must remove any boats from the property. Stress over the sailboat's unfulfilled fate, she said, is compromising her father's already shaky health.
"His problem is the attachment, it's sentimental," Goff said. "He's crying. He's spending his last days worrying about getting this boat out of here."
Wachstein said the family's situation with the boat illustrates problems heirs can have disposing of items left by departed parents. Her father also built her an elaborate 4-foot-tall dollhouse, complete with electricity and cedar shingles, that she couldn't sell or give away. She ultimately donated it to a children's home.
A massage therapist, Wachstein also recalled a client who was unable to give away an organ left by a deceased aunt.
Brown, confined to his trailer and an oxygen tank, envisions living long enough to see his father's dream come to fruition.
"I want to see it finished, my father in his grave would love that," he said. "I'd like to take a ride in it, so I've got something to tell my daddy when I see him."
Queries about the boat may be made to Stephanie Goff at [email protected].
Sad story, guy is dying and the boat has never gotten wet!
In the days he has remaining, Arthur Ray Brown has but one wish: to find a home for the unfinished wooden sailboat his father lovingly began crafting by hand six decades ago.
"It means a lot to my heart. I'd like to see a good person get it before I go," said Brown, 63, whose life-sapping lung disease has him under 24-hour home hospice care. "I'm at the bottom line now."
Outside Brown's Fort Lauderdale mobile home, propped on stands under blue tarps, rests the 24-foot boat that represents his father's legacy. With its roly-poly custom design, it resembles a child's bath toy, but it's never been in the water. Its blue and white hull, though stained, is constructed of still healthy Dade County pine. It has a brown cabin and mahogany transom, but no engine or mast.
And Brown can't even give it away.
He tried to sell it for $2,500, then kept dropping the price, eventually to $500. No takers. He offered it to schools and the Salvation Army. No interest. He finally put it on Craigslist — no charge. But still the boat remains
"I have dropped the price so much, now I'm saying it's for free," Brown said. "I can't figure out why nobody wants it. You just pay to move it."
In 1953, his father, Frank Brown, an ironworker, began building the ark-like vessel in his Miami backyard. He steamed and bent each plank by hand, planed wood, welded fittings and melted lead on the kitchen stove to pour the keel. For more than 20 years he labored on the boat through nights and weekends, often whistling as he worked.
"It was a dream that he had, to complete this sailboat and put it in the water and go," said daughter Louise Wachstein, 62, of Tampa. "He was always looking at the sky, somewhat like a mariner."
The boat became part of the children's lives. Apart from visits to the beach, it was the closest they ever got to the water. They helped with its construction, bailed out rainwater and cleared it of leaves. Neighbors observed with amusement. "Most of them kind of looked at it like a big joke," Wachstein said. "They would make fun of it and say, 'Noah's Ark.'"
In the mid-'70s, a job-related injury checked Frank Brown's progress on the vessel he sometimes called the Enigma. He was relegated to simple maintenance — painting, sanding, polishing — on the 80 percent completed craft. He and his wife Kay moved to Fort Pierce, along with the boat they still dreamed of one day sailing away in.
But in 1986, while in her backyard, Kay was felled by a heart attack. Thirty-one days later Frank also died. His son Arthur trailered the boat back south, storing it at the Opa-locka powerboat company where he worked, and later at his mobile home. He made sure it was always covered, or sheltered indoors.
"I've kept it for 25 years the best I can. This is as far as I can take it," Brown said.
His daughter, Stephanie Goff, of Hollywood, said her father's landlord has notified all tenants they must remove any boats from the property. Stress over the sailboat's unfulfilled fate, she said, is compromising her father's already shaky health.
"His problem is the attachment, it's sentimental," Goff said. "He's crying. He's spending his last days worrying about getting this boat out of here."
Wachstein said the family's situation with the boat illustrates problems heirs can have disposing of items left by departed parents. Her father also built her an elaborate 4-foot-tall dollhouse, complete with electricity and cedar shingles, that she couldn't sell or give away. She ultimately donated it to a children's home.
A massage therapist, Wachstein also recalled a client who was unable to give away an organ left by a deceased aunt.
Brown, confined to his trailer and an oxygen tank, envisions living long enough to see his father's dream come to fruition.
"I want to see it finished, my father in his grave would love that," he said. "I'd like to take a ride in it, so I've got something to tell my daddy when I see him."
Queries about the boat may be made to Stephanie Goff at [email protected].
03-30-2014 | 11:17 AM
#5
Neno the mind boggler
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From: toledo oh
I think Phragle Rob can relate to this 
Hey Rob do you have any pics of your dads Tri? That thing was cool and a Point Place landmark
Hey Rob do you have any pics of your dads Tri? That thing was cool and a Point Place landmark
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Throttles- Cleveland Construction 377 Talon
08 OPA Class 1 National Champion
08 Class 1 Geico Triple Crown Champion
08 OPA High Points Champion
10 OPA Class 1 National Champion ( happy now Ed! )
03-30-2014 | 11:31 AM
#6
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From: Pasadena, MD
Very sad. I almost wish I could do it. Shame some school like the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum (http://www.cbmm.org/index.htm) would not pick it up but I bet its to far away for them.
03-30-2014 | 12:18 PM
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From: Richmond, Virginia
Very sad. I almost wish I could do it. Shame some school like the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum (http://www.cbmm.org/index.htm) would not pick it up but I bet its to far away for them.
