ROSEMARY – but which one?
Feature photo & background info ex Harold Kidd.Ozone & Rosemary photo ex classicboatsnz. Other photos & email ex Melvin Adams
There has been a lot of chat / debate recently on ww concerning the the launch Rosemary in regard to her origins & what became of her over the years. Things are complicated by the fact that there have been / still are several Rosemarys out there. You can read the chat here https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/08/27/ozone-rosemary/comment-page-1/#comment-11545
Todays post is focussing on the launch that was built in St.Mary’s Bay by Leon Warne in December 1920 for himself and his brother George and was taken north for game-fishing out of Russell. The Warne brothers then set up boatbuilding, repairs as well as gameboat chartering at Russell. Rosemary originally had a Scripps 4 cylinder but was later fitted with a Redwing. She was one of several launches that were very successful in promoting the deep sea angling sport in the Bay of Islands, both from Russell and Whangaroa.
Rosemary was originally launched as a dashing flushdecker. As pictured in the photo above from “N Z Vintage Launches” of her on the Waitemata in the 1925 Anniversary Regatta.
Enter Melvin Adams who has a launch named Rosemary, moored in Mill Bay Mangonui. Melvin has owned the boat for approx 10 years & has been tracking her past & is confident that his Rosemary is the same boat (Leon Warne) pictured above. She has a more ‘spacious’ cabin these days. One of Melvin’s photos below indicates the areas where he can clearly see the areas where portholes used to be.
Below is a photo montage showing Rosemary thru-out the years – I’ll let you be the judge if Melvin’s Rosemary is the Warne built ex game boat.
Make sure you read the e-mail from one of her previous owners – Don Jansen to Melvin , is a good tale of life as a ‘commercial’ fisherman.
As always – click on photos to enlarge 🙂
I’m guessing the transition from racer to deep sea fishing boat saw some considerable changes in the boats lines, maybe even its length? This photo shows a good side-on view not long before it left ownership of the Warne family in the early-mid seventies. What happened from there on in is up for debate.
http://www.classicboatsnewzealand.com/#!Rosemary/zoom/c8ez/imageg7d
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We have photos of 3 Rosemarys above, do we not? The for’d porthole on Melvin’s Rosemary looks to me to about 100mm too far forward to be the racer? And the sportfishing one is defferent altogether than the others, with different sheer and more portholes
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The letter above certainly does not pertain to the Warne-built Rosemary seeing as she was under the ownership of the Warnes (mainly George Warne) right up into the early seventies from the time of her build pre-war. I’m failing to see any similarity in the lines unfortunately between the original boat and the revamped one – but apparently Ken Warne has confirmed this boat in Mangonui as being the Warne-built Rosemary?
Steve Warne
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Ah whoops yes there was meant to also be a question mark there. Doug is a friend in KK also, His wife Wendy a local artist
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Negative. The three Galbraiths on TARA were owner Norm Galbraith and his two sons Don and Doug who were prominent sheetmetal engineers on the North Shore.
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NB- is the Galbraith mentioned in the email, the same one who owned(/crewed?) Col Wild’s Tara with Alan Oram, a friend of my mother. Both are Kerikeri folk
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2 stories here if I am not mistaken, one the story of a man who owned a Rosemary from 1954- and another who owned ‘THE’ Rosemary from build until 1970’s….
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