HMCo #479s Gloria [Sailing Tender for St.Y. Margarita]

"[1896-10-24] Sat 24: Launched & shipped 19' wl catboat #479 [Gloria] for A. J. Drexel. ..." (Source: Herreshoff, Nathanael G. Diary, 1896. Manuscript (excerpts). Herreshoff Marine Museum Collection.)

"The Castle Marblehead, Massachusetts
September 27, 1960.
Mrs. M. C. Fisher, Alan-Clarke Company, 75 Chambers Street, New York, 7, N. Y.
Dear Madam:
Your interesting letter with the photographs of your little yachts were received with pleasure.
It is just possible that this was originally the cat boat GLORIA that was built to be a sailing tender for the steamship MAYFLOWER, owned by A. J. Drexel of Philadelphia. When she was built GLORIA had a shallow keel with a centerboard going down through it, and was an open cat boat, but I can't think of any other boat of about this model and size that was designed by my father.
I note what you say about the excellent condition of the boat, and feel you have selected a most romantic name. I am sorry I can't give you any more information.
Yours truly,
[L. Francis Herreshoff]
4 photographs enclosed." (Source: Herreshoff, L. F. Letter to M. C. Fisher, New York, dated September 27, 1960.)

"BRISTOL. R. I., June 2, 1900. ... Frank P. Howe of Philadelphia has purchased a racing catboat, the Gloria, from Anthony Drexel. She was carried on davits on the steam yacht Margarita. The Gloria was built here [at Herreshoff in Bristol]. She is now being overhauled at Saunders yard. ..." (Source: Anon. "The Virginia's Launching." Boston Herald, June 3, 1900, p. 20.)

"N/A"

"[Item Description:] Penciled pantograph hull sections and lead sections titled '#479 [GLORIA]. 19ft 3in w.l. c.b. cat[boat]. Oct[ober] 3, 1896'. With calculations arriving at a displacement of 64.4cuft = 4150lbs. On verso another set of penciled pantograph lead sections titled 'Lead for # 478 [sic, i.e. #479 GLORIA (478 would have been a fin keel)]. Oct[ober] 4, 1896'. With calculations arriving at 1632lbs lead and noting the presence of a centerboard." (Source: Herreshoff, N.G. (creator). Pantograph Lead Sections. Halsey C. Herreshoff Collection at the Herreshoff Marine Museum Item MRDE04_05800. Folder [no #]. 1896-10-04.)
① ② ③ ④

Note: This list of archival documents contains in an unedited form any and all which mention #479s Gloria [Sailing Tender for St.Y. Margarita] even if just in a cursory way. Permission to digitize, transcribe and display is gratefully acknowledged.

• Gloria (HMCo-made index card)
• Gloria (MIT Museum-made index card)
• Note: The vessel index cards comprise two sets of a total of some 3200 cards about vessels built by HMCo, with dimensions and information regarding drawings, later or former vessel names, and owners. They were compiled from HMCo's early days until 1920 and added to in later decades, apparently by Hart Nautical curator William A. Baker and his successors. While HMCo seems to have used only one set of index cards, all sorted by name and, where no name was available, by number, later users at MIT apparently divided them into two sets of cards, one sorted by vessel name, the other by vessel number and greatly expanded the number of cards. Original HMCo cards are usually lined and almost always punched with a hole at bottom center while later cards usually have no hole, are unlined, and often carry substantially less information. All cards are held by the Francis Russell Hart Nautical Collections of the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Mass.

Name: Gloria
Type: Cat
Length: 19'2"
Owner: Drexel, A. J.

Source: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company. "A Partial List of Herreshoff Clients." In: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company. Herreshoff Yachts. Bristol, Rhode Island, ca. 1931.

• Gloria
• Note: The L. Francis Herreshoff index cards comprise a set of some 1200 cards about vessels built by HMCo, with dimensions and / or ownership information. Apparently compiled in the early 1930s, for later HMCo-built boats like the Fishers Island 23s or the Northeast Harbor 30s are not included. Added to in later decades, apparently by L. F. Herreshoff as well as his long-time secretary Muriel Vaughn and others. Also 46 cards of L. F. Herreshoff-designed vessels. The original set of index cards is held by the Herreshoff Marine Museum and permission to display is gratefully acknowledged.

Name: Gloria
Type: 19' 2" catboat; sailing tender for "Mayflower"
Owner: A. J. Drexel
Row No.: 252

Source: Herreshoff, L. Francis. "Partial List of Herreshoff-Built Boats." In: Herreshoff, L. Francis. Capt. Nat Herreshoff. The Wizard of Bristol. New York, 1953, p. 325-343.

Month: Sept
Day: 26
Year: 1896
E/P/S: S
No.: 0479
Name: Gloria
LW: 19' 2"
B: 7' 4 1/2"
D: 2' 7"
Rig: Cat
K: FK
CB: y
Ballast: Lead
Amount: $1300.00
Last Name: Dupel?
First Name: A. J.

Source: Vermilya, Peter and Maynard Bray. "Transcription of the HMCo. Construction Record." Unpublished database, ca. 2000.

Note: The transcription of the HMCo Construction Record by Peter Vermilya and Maynard Bray was performed independently (and earlier) than that by Claas van der Linde. A comparison of the two transcriptions can be particularly useful in those many cases where the handwriting in the Construction Record is difficult to decipher.

"A letter from L. F. Herreshoff dated September 27, 1960 suggests that a catboat owned by M. C. Fisher in New York in 1960 was Gloria. Further correspondence on file at the Herreshoff Marine Museum dated June 16, 1998 from Mel Fisher, the son of M. C. Fisher, states 'My father purchased the boat from a small boat yard in Douglaston, Queens, New York in the late 1950's. I recall the yard still launched boats on greased skids which was vital for old, wooden boats. As I recall, the boat had a small, oval plaque with the date '1885' (as I recall) and 'Bristol, RI'. Also, there was an opening for the mast thru the deck forward of the location you see in the picture - which would agree with an earlier cat-boat rig speculation of the enclosed letter. My father sold the boat in 1963 to a customer of his in Brooklyn, NY. Unfortunately, I can only recall his first name (John), who was a salesman in the audio field. He kept the boat in a marina in Brooklyn. The picture was from 1960-1961 on Long Island Sound in the Huntington-Northport, New York area. My father and mother ran a small sailmaking / sailboat hardware business in New York City and later on Long Island from the 1940's until 1979 when he passed away.' A response letter from curator Carlton Pinheiro to Mel Fisher suggests that Carlton Pinheiro also believed this catboat to have been #479s Gloria." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. December 28, 2008.)

"L. F. Herreshoff in his list of Herreshoff-built boats lists Gloria as having been built for A. J. Drexel as a 'sailing tender for Mayflower'. However, even though the palatial steam yacht Mayflorer was built in the same year as Gloria, 1896, she was not owned by Drexel but by Ogden Goelet. Drexel was the owner of another grand steamyacht, Margarita. Was Gloria (and possibly also #478s Half-rater for A. J. Drexel) built as a sailing tender for the steam yacht Margarita? Carrying a sailing boat on a steam yacht was not unheard of, as #542s Mishe Nahma, the half-rater built in 1900 for Robert W. Goelet's widow's steam yacht Nahma (and possibly also #478s Half-rater for A. J. Drexel), shows." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. October 21, 2010.)

"Built in 28 days (contract to launch; equivalent to $46/day, 150 lbs displacement/day)." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. January 16, 2024.)

Note: Research notes contain information about a vessel that is often random and unedited but has been deemed useful for future research.