A month ago Lake Champlain Maritime Museum’s schooner Lois McClure left her home port on a mission of self-preservation.
She was headed for dry dock above Lock E3 of the Erie Canal to meet a team of shipwrights. The restoration has gotten underway and the museum has posted an update on YouTube:
Work on the 12-year-old schooner is being completed at the New York State Canal Corporation shipyard at Waterford, New York under the supervision of David Short, of North Atlantic Shipbuilding and Repair, in West Montville, Maine. So far the work has primarily involved replacing dry-rotted planking and timbers and recaulking seams.
“We’re especially grateful to the McClure family and to the many donors, volunteers, and friends of the schooner who made her first decade so successful, and whose enlightened support provides for the maintenance essential to her continued operation,” said Michael Smiles, executive director of the Maritime Museum. “Schooner Lois McClure has been the most effective outreach program LCMM has ever conducted, and a leader in the world of Maritime Museums. The schooner will be in highly qualified hands for this essential maintenance work, and we are already looking forward to her 2016 season.”
