ALICE MAY in 2008 in the Hawkesbury River area of NSW

Images(6)

ALICE MAY, February 1950 in Tasmania with Edna Cato aboard.

Alice May

Vessel numberHV000381

Vessel Registration NumberWILSN

Date1927

DimensionsVessel Dimensions: 9.14 m x 9.14 m x 2.44 m x 0.91 m (30 ft x 30 ft x 8 ft x 3 ft)

DescriptionALICE MAY was named after Alice May Marsh, a close friend of Sidney Wilson's wife Frances. Sidney was a ship's carpenter who built the 7.7 metre ALICE MAY in the backyard of his house at Esplanade Road, Cygnet. He launched it a short distance away at Martins Point. At the helm station is the kauri pine ship's wheel made by Viv Innes from the Tasmanian trading ketch HUON CHIEF. The ketch was burnt in 1938 at Victoria Dock, Hobart. ALICE MAY was built for fishing and recreational boating.

ALICE MAY was built with a variety of Tasmanian timbers. It is planked and framed in Huon Pine, with blue gum stringers and celery top pine floors. The deck is a combination of Huon and Baltic pine, repaired recently with celery top pine. The cabin sides are Huon and King Billy Pine.

Sidney owned ALICE MAY for twenty years until selling it to his nephew 'Bart' Wilson Cato in 1947. In 1948 Walter Wilson, at that time principal of boatbuilders Wilson Bros, added 1.5 metres to the stern. He replaced the canvas curtains around the cockpit with plywood panels and windows. Bart's younger brother inherited ALICE MAY in 1965, and sold it in 1978. It changed hands three more times before the current owner bought it in 2007.

A previous owner employed Cygnet shipwright Lindsay Wood to overhaul and restore ALICE MAY to its post-1948 arrangement, based on photos and evidence on the hull.

It has always been predominately a 'Sunday' boat based around the Huon area until 2007, but on holiday trips it ventured out to Bruny Island and even up to Hobart. Early in its life it was also the pursuit or rescue craft for Cygnet regattas.

ALICE MAY's original engine is unknown but it had a petrol Admiral Simplex motor in the early 1960s. This was replaced with a Morris Navigator in 1965. Diesel took over in 1978 when a Yanmar engine was installed. Currrently it has another Yanmar 3-cylinder engine.

SignificanceALICE MAY is a timber motor launch designed and built in 1927 by Sidney Wilson, one of the well known Wilson Bros family of boat builders from Port Cygnet in south eastern Tasmania. It was used for weekend recreation and referred to as a 'Sunday boat' . ALICE MAY remained in Tasmania for eighty years until being sold to owners on the Hawkesbury River in New South Wales in 2007. There is little change in the boat's original construction and arrangement.