Boating New Zealand – April 2018

110 Boating New Zealand

feature

Sailor

Scribes

WORDS BY MATT VANCE

PHOTOGRAPHY SUPPLIED

It is a cruel twist of human nature that everyone remembers

firsts – seconds are forgotten. Ed Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.

Anyone heard of Ernst Schmied and Juerg Marmet? Joshua

Slocum is the solo-sailing legend – despite two-and-a-half

circumnavigations Harry Pidgeon faded into obscurity.

erhaps it was Harry’s humble

wholesomeness and quiet determination

that kept him below the radar – or maybe

his unlikely background. Born in land-

locked Iowa in 1869, he had a hard, Quaker

upbringing which gave him a rugged

independence. But the rural upbringing meant he never learnt

to swim and didn’t see the sea until he arrived in California at

the age of 18.

Te constant presence of the sea in California got him

dreaming about far horizons, but it wasn’t until he purchased

the plans for a Seagoer design from Rudder magazine for two

dollars that he began to put his dreams into action.

Harry found a rent-free space near the shore of the Los

Angeles harbour and, at nearly 50 years old, built the 34-

foot yawl Islander in 18 months and for less than a thousand

dollars. He built her strongly – oak, Oregon pine and Douglas

fr – her strength tested by many groundings and brushes with

reefs across the Pacifc.

Harry was proud of his boat: “Te Islander was my frst

attempt at building a sail-boat, but I don’t suppose there ever

was an amateur built craft that so nearly fulflled the dream of

her owner, or that a landsman ever came so near to weaving a

magic carpet on the sea.”

After quietly launching Islander, Harry Pidgeon set about

learning navigation from books in the San Pedro Library and

practised his sailing skills in short coastal hops and voyages to

nearby Catalina Island. A test run to Hawaii and back proved

Unsung but

unfussed

P

HARRY PIDGEON