Thanks Jackie. If anyone else has anything they would like to contribute, please feel free to send it in.

A Ballad of John Silver by John Masefield Recited to the fleet by Captain Stephen Mann June 30, 2000 S/V Tawodi Lat. N31:45 Long. W137:50 We were schooner rigged and rakish with a long and lissome hull And we flew the pretty colors of the crossbones and the skull. We had a big black Jolly Rodger flapping grimly at the fore. And we sailed the Spanish water in the happy days of yore. We had a long brass gun amidship like a well conducted ship We each had a brace of pistols and a cutlass at the hip. It's a point that tells against us and a fact to be deplored, but We chased the goodly merchantmen and laid their ships aboard. Then the dead men fouled the scuppers and the wounded filled the chains And the paintwork was all splatterdashed with other people's brains. She was boarded, she was looted, she was scuttled till she sank And the pale survivors left us by the medium of the plank. Oh then it was how saddening by the aft rail on the poop You could hear the drowning folk lament the absent chicken coop. And having washed the blood away we had little else to do Than dance a quiet hornpipe as the old salts taught us to. Ah the fiddle on the forecastle and the flapping naked soles And the genial "Down the middle Jake, and curtsey when she rolls". The silver seas around us and the pale moon overhead The lookout not a looking and his pipe bowl glowing red. Ah the pigtailed quidding pirates and the pretty pranks we played All have since been put a stop to by the naughty Board of Trade. The schooners and the merry crews are laid away to rest A little south the sunset in the islands of the blessed.

Sea-Fever by John Masefield I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking, And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking. I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying. I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life. To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over. John Masefield (1878-1967) Click here for a full list of poems.

John Masefield (1878-1967) Poet laureate of Great Britain from 1930 until his death, John Masefield was only 22 years old when he wrote the simple and moving lines in his poem 'Sea Fever'. Masefield was born on June 1, 1878, in Ledbury, Herefordshire, England. After his father's death he was looked after by an uncle. Young Masefield wanted to be a merchant marine officer. At 13 he boarded the training ship Conway moored in the river Mersey. After two and a half years on the school ship he was apprenticed aboard a sailing ship that was bound for Chile by way of Cape Horn. In Chile he became ill and had to return to England by steamer. He left the sea and spent several years living in the United States, working chiefly in a carpet factory. At one time, in 1895, to be exact, he worked for a few months as a sort of third assistant bar-keeper and dish-washer in Luke O'Connor's saloon, the Columbia Hotel, in New York City. The place is still there on the corner of Sixth and Greenwich Avenues. He later wrote about that period of his life in an autobiographical work, 'In the Mill', published in 1941. In 1897 he returned to England determined to succeed as a writer. He worked on newspapers at first. But he never forgot his days at sea. He returned to them again and again in his poems and stories. He wrote about the land too, about typically English things like fox hunting, racing, and outdoor life. In 1902 Masefield published his first volume of poems, 'Salt-Water Ballads'. After that he wrote steadily poems, stories, and plays. In 1903 he married Constance de la Cherois-Crommelin. They had two children. In World War I Masefield served in the Red Cross in France and on a hospital ship at Gallipoli. His book 'Gallipoli' (1916) is an account of that campaign. He died on May 12, 1967, near Abingdon in Berkshire, England.

Explaining the Term 'Tall Ship' The Associated Press, Thu 27 Jul 2000 PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — It's the last port of call for the majestic tall ships heading up the East Coast. Perhaps, then, it's time for someone to explain. What the heck is a tall ship, anyway? Some people say it's a square-rigged sailing vessel, while others say it's any large sailing vessel, regardless of rigging. Some say simply that you'll know it when you see the masts on the horizon. ``If it looks like a tall ship, it is a tall ship,'' said retired Coast Guard Rear Adm. Richard Rybacki, president of OpSail Maine 2000. Through the summer, the fleet of tall ships sailing into harbors for OpSail 2000 have included a variety of brigs, brigantines, schooners, sloops, ketches, yawls, barques and barquentines. Some of the vessels have parted ways, but the remainder — more than 20 tall ships — are participating in the final Parade of Sail in Portland Harbor on Friday. Some old salts, especially the purists, say that only a few of those vessels are actually ``tall ships.'' Technically, a ``ship'' is a vessel with three masts and square rigging, or sails, said David Blanchard, editor of the Nautical Research Journal in Camden, Maine. The 356-foot Libertad, an Argentine vessel that's the largest to visit Portland, is definitely a ship (and with a rig of about 190 feet, it's also tall by most people's definition). But the 125-foot-long Spirit of Massachusetts is just a schooner, for example. By Blanchard's definition, there are at least three tall ships and more smaller vessels in Maine's Parade of Sail. Regardless, ``tall ship'' is not a true nautical term, he said. ``A tall ship is a meaningless term for people who are serious students of ship history,'' Blanchard insisted. Many people believe it is a generic label thought up by landlubbers to give the vessels marketing cache. ``Tall ship, that's another Madison Avenue term. There's no such thing,'' said Kip Files, captain of the 170-foot, three-masted Victory Chimes, which takes people on excursions off the Maine coast. Others have more romantic recollections of the term's origin. They can thank British poet laureate John Masefield, according to many nautical historians. Margherita Desy, curator of the USS Constitution Museum in Boston, said Masefield coined the term in his 1902 poem ``Sea Fever,'' about his longing for the ocean: ``I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by ... '' Some accept the term to mean an important ship with large sails and tall masts. ``It's a term like calling a person a VIP,'' said Peter Stanford, president of the National Maritime Historical Society in Peekskill, N.Y. ``A tall ship is a big sailing ship of traditional design, the kind of ship that opened the whole world to human intercourse and brought the divided branches of mankind together,'' he said. ``So it's a pretty important heritage.''