boatbuilding

Participants may arrive at Rocking the Boat not knowing how to read a ruler and having never used tools, but they work together to build full size traditional wooden rowing and sailing boats from scratch. Boatbuilding students and apprentices study the plans and create and assemble all of the components from stem to stern, fasten the planks and frames, paint, and then launch their boat into the Bronx River.

Rocking the Boat purposely chooses boat designs that have historically been built and used by New Yorkers as a way of connecting participants to the City's maritime past.

Throughout the school year, a group of 16 Boatbuilding students work to construct a 17-foot Whitehall, the classic rowboat design that comprises the majority of Rocking the Boat’s fleet.

Students fashion four ash oars for every Rocking the Boat boat.  They use block planes and spoke shaves to remove layer after layer of wood, taking a four-sided block down to an octagonal shaft then to a hexadecagon (16-sided polygon) and ultimately to a smooth rounded column with a ½ inch thick blade at one end and a leathered grip on the other.

In keeping with Rocking the Boat tradition, Boatbuilding apprentices are taking on an exciting new project: a faithful copy of the 27’ Whitehall rowing gig American Star, the winner of a famous rowing race in New York Harbor that launched competitive rowing as a sport in this country.  Built in Brooklyn in 1824, American Star was given as a gift to Revolutionary War commander the Marquis de Lafayette upon his farewell tour of the U.S. The original is still housed at Lafayette’s home at the Château de la Grange-Bléneau in north-central France.   The project will be completed in good time to participate in the boat’s bicentennial celebration in 2024.