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11 Most Endangered
Schooner C.A. Thayer
Year Listed: 1993
Location: San Francisco , California
Current Status: Saved
Threat: Deterioration
Significance
The C.A. Thayer is one of the last surviving sailing schooners designed for the turn-of-the-century West Coast lumber trade. Built in 1895, the wooden-hulled Thayer had a remarkable career, progressing from lumber-hauling to the fishing trade to serving as a U.S. Army barge in World War II. When she was finally retired in 1950, the Thayer was the last commercial sailing vessel operating from a U.S. West Coast port. In more recent times, the schooner's three masts became a familiar site at the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. But the C.A. Thayer's massive timbers were badly rotted and the strength and watertight integrity of her hull were threatened by shipworms. Without thorough reconstruction, the ship was in danger of continuing to weaken until she eventually sank. Funds were desperately needed to carry out a five-year restoration effort.
Updates
On December 2, 2003, the Thayer was guided by tugboats across the San Francisco Bay to the Bay Ship and Yacht shipyard in Alameda, where a two-year, $9.6 million restoration was completed in April 2007. The federal government appropriated funds for the restoration project over a three-year period. During the restoration, several tons of rotted timbers were removed and discarded from the 156-foot-long ship, though any salvageable materials were reused. The ship was stripped down to its skeleton and then reconstructed above the waterline, using new materials but imitating the original form. The salvaged deck house was removed and then reinstalled to enable rebuilding the lower portions of the schooner. The restoration work also adapted and rehabilitated areas of the vessel to its appearance as a lumber schooner during its primary period of significance from 1895 to 1912. Additional restoration work will continue at the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park’s Hyde Street Pier for a number of years, with the goal of preparing the Thayer to sail once again. Ongoing projects will include restoration of sailing rig, completion of the forward deckhouse, and installation of interior fittings. The magnitude of the Park Service’s restoration work on the C.A. Thayer is unprecedented in the history of modern maritime preservation and will ensuring that the schooner can survive for another hundred years.
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