Video
Donny Ernestina-Morrissey Interview
Transcript
00;00;04;04 - 00;00;10;25
Speaker 1
My name is Spencer Donahower, though on the boat I go by Donny. I'm a deckhand, so basically just do what I'm told.
00;00;10;25 - 00;00;13;26
Speaker 1
I'm from New York, originally the Rochester area.
00;00;13;26 - 00;00;30;03
Speaker 1
A little village called Fairport. And when I was 12, I randomly wanted to learn how to sail. And at the time, I was thinking more like yachty-type, like 420s or sonars or the ones you'd see it like a yacht club.
00;00;30;03 - 00;00;35;22
Speaker 1
So my mom went looking and she found this organization up in Canada.
00;00;35;24 - 00;01;15;17
Speaker 1
It was actually a tall ship that was run by teenagers. So 13 to 18. So I did that from the ages of 13 to 19. And then because it was run by kids, there was a certain age you could be to be in the program. Once you got past a certain age, you aged out basically. And when I turned 18, I did the last summer and then that September, I left the boat after working on it after the summer for a couple of months and found this boat on an ad on Facebook. It was a complete shot in the dark because the ad went up in April. And I thought they would already be
00;01;15;17 - 00;01;42;17
Speaker 1
full, but I decided, why not? And just, you know, applied. And then three weeks later, I came on on November 9th last year. When I came on, she was still up in Boothbay, Maine, and that was when she was put in the water. She's put in the water last summer and was in Boothbay still getting stuff up. But when I came on, none of the sails were on, the gas for the fo’c’sle and the main weren't on yet.
00;01;42;17 - 00;01;46;21
Speaker 1
Down below was still no mattresses. Every bunk it tools in it.
00;01;46;21 - 00;01;48;11
Speaker 1
There's still a lot of work to be done.
00;01;48;11 - 00;01;50;23
Speaker 1
And the first day it was just put to work.
00;01;50;23 - 00;01;56;23
Speaker 1
At first, we didn't really have many systems in place, and there was still so many crew changes,
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Speaker 1
when we left, we had new mates, half the crew was new, so we were still getting used to each other and like, getting to know each other and getting to know the boat.
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Speaker 1
Like there's a sole board right outside of Chuck's bunk that isn't level.
00;02;10;10 - 00;02;28;14
Speaker 1
I used to step on that a lot and wake him up, but now I'm used to it. And then as we kept going, we kept losing crew members and gaining crew members because a mate would come on, but they'd only be able to come on for a week or two and then leave and gain another one, and they'd go for a bit and leave, and we gained another one.
00;02;28;14 - 00;02;42;16
Speaker 1
So there's a lot of crew changes, but other than that, we mainly motored because we didn't have the people to set sail and maintain the watches because we only had 2 or 3 people a watch or 3 or 4 people to watch.
00;02;42;16 - 00;02;46;02
Speaker 1
We only got rocky weather a couple times. A handful of times.
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Speaker 1
A lot of rain storms.
00;02;47;13 - 00;03;07;11
Speaker 1
It got really hectic in the Gulf, coming from Galveston back to Pensacola. That's when now Trinidad had to back off and miss Pensacola Festival because it was too rough for her. I really like being the cook. I like how chaotic it is. That's like the main reason why many people don't like it. I also don't get seasick well, that easily.
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Speaker 1
The most I've ever gotten is I get a little queasy.
00;03;10;04 - 00;03;19;09
Speaker 1
I also like going up a loft. That's why I like the square riggers a lot more. Because you have a lot more reasons to go up there, while on a schooner you really don't
00;03;19;09 - 00;03;21;27
Speaker 1
unless you're taking 3D scans
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Speaker 1
or something breaks. But if something breaks, then it's probably an engineer going up and not me.
00;03;27;21 - 00;03;31;29
Speaker 2
Do you have a favorite story from your time here on the Ernestina?
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Speaker 2
a favorite part of her history that you
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Speaker 1
It's cool, like hearing about how she brought immigrants over from Cape Verde and then being here where there's a big Cape Verdean population, like even driving.
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Speaker 1
When Sissy and I went out to dinner yesterday, driving back, we saw Cape Verdean flags on so many houses and having people come over and be like, “oh yeah, my grandpa came over on this boat.”
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Speaker 1
I think that's really cool.
00;03;54;19 - 00;04;13;21
Speaker 1
Right now, she's still got a lot of work to be done, like the Maretron system. We got completely put in a new one. We're still working towards our COI - Certification of Inspection - to be able to bring passengers out on the water. So right now we have a dockside COI. That's why we were able to do the festivals down in the Gulf.
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Speaker 1
But we can't bring passengers out onto the water. So that's what we're working towards. Right now, everything we do is just working towards that
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Speaker 1
and in the future, we're trying to get cadets on for Mass Maritime to be to do sails with them, and we'll bring teachers on and they'll do classes, science stuff, teach them how to sail.
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Speaker 1
And I think sail training is her life right now for quite a while. You can only learn so much talking to someone talking to someone. We had,
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Speaker 1
troubles teaching
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Speaker 1
some of the crew members who didn't really know as much as others because we haven't done the maneuvers yet. Like we were trying to teach people what jibing and tacking look like.
00;04;53;24 - 00;05;15;01
Speaker 1
And we haven't done that much because we haven't really sailed at that point. So it's hard to teach them because we can tell them all we want, what it looks like. But if they don't see it, then they won't know. You can learn all you want, but you'll really learn through the experience of going through it and stepping back and looking at how the sails maneuver and how the boat maneuvers, and how each person does their own job,
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Speaker 1
with each sail.
Descriptive Transcript
The video begins with a black background. It then transitions to another black background with all text centered on the screen. The white text at the top reads: "Donny." Below it, a green horizontal line divides the text. The bottom line reads: "Schooner Ernestina-Morrissey" in white. The title page text shrinks to a smaller size and moves to the top left corner. The black background remains, and white closed captioned text appears in the center of the screen, double-lined in a large font size.
Description
Join Spencer Donahower, a deckhand known as Donny, as he shares his journey from learning to sail at 12 to working on the Schooner Ernestina-Morrissey. Starting with tall ship experiences in Canada, Spencer recounts his time onboard Ernestina, the challenges of crew changes, and the excitement of preparing the ship for sailing. He highlights the importance of hands-on experience in sailing and the rich history of the Ernestina, including its role in Cape Verdean immigration.
Duration
5 minutes, 16 seconds
Credit
NPS Video
Date Created
06/03/2024
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