Abbott Moth design pix

Here are a couple of the promised photos of a Fran Abbott-designed Moth Boat.  The boat featured, Nr 1600, is the one Fran built for his daughter Kay.  This boat is currently owned by William Duffield.

Abbott Moth "Com-on-K" viewed from the bow with your diarist in the hot seat.  The venue was the 2008 Brigantine YC annual Moth Boat Regatta.

The same boat a few years earlier, this time with Jeff Gerber skippering.  NB: the sail was borrowed from another boat.

Just to put Bill Boyle's rather daunting project into perspective, below are some photos of his Abbott in "as found" condition. This poor boat is almost beyond salvation.  Luckily the keel and major structural elements are sound and can be reused.  This boat will look like a new penny after Bill re-skins her with new ply panels.  Some of the hand made hardware specific to the Abbott Moth such as the combination bow handle and stem fitting, the drain cock, etc. have survived.  However along with rebuilding the hull, Bill will have to make new spars and blades.

Nr 1603, port quarter.  The item seen dangling from the bottom of the transom is one of Fran Abbott's hand made drain cocks.  When this boat was build many items had to be made up by the builder. Fran taught himself the arts of bronze casting and metal fabrication in addition to woodworking.  Specialty dinghy hardware manufacturing which we now take for granted was in it's infancy when this boat was built, with a just few small pioneer companies such as Race-Lite and Rollege producing a limited range.  Harken and Ronstan were decades away into the future.  Back then, if you needed something that the local hardware store couldn't supply you made it yourself!

Nr 1603 as found, behind a Chestertown, Maryland warehouse which Bob Patterson had just rented for his business.  Perhaps someone will recognize this boat from the remnant of unusual green-blue colored paint seen on the side board towards the bow.  It would be interesting to learn how this boat came to rest here, a long way from Ocean City, New Jersey.