We awoke yesterday morning to see this sight: the Schooner Stephen Taber and its apparently sleeping passengers moored in Great Cove, just off of Babson Island. She was on a privately chartered cruise, according to her schedule:
By the time that I could get to the shore late that morning, she was gone. However, here’s one of my archive images of her under full sail, when she’s most impressive:
Leighton Archive Image
The 110-foot Taber was built in 1871 and is a National Historic Landmark that hails from Rockland, Maine. Curiously, she was named after a once-famed, but now forgotten,19th Century New York politician.
As with many coastal cargo cruisers in the 1800s, the Taber was built with a flat bottom to “ground out” and discharge her cargo without the need for a pier. She does have a centerboard to lower as a keel during cruising, but has no motor; her motorized yawl boat Babe pushes her in light air.
(Primary image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on July 1, 2022.)