Oyster buy-boat
An oyster buy-boat, also known as deck boat, is an approximately 40–90 foot long wooden boat with a large open deck which serviced
History
Rise
Some Chesapeake Bay buyboats such as the William B. Tennison began their lives as sailing vessels that were converted for power when internal combustion engines became available. Most buyboats, however, including those built for power, retained a single sail into the 1930s when engines became more powerful and reliable. Most Chesapeake Bay buyboats had plank-on-frame hulls like the Nellie Crockett, but a few were built as log canoes, such as the F.D. Crockett, a rare surviving example of this type. Buy-boats had a rear-mounted deck house over the engine that contained the wheel house that typically had a rounded front with three to five windows, a galley, a head, and bunks for the crew. Some boats also had additional bunks up in the fore-peak for crew members.
Buy-boats saw their heyday in the first half of the 20th century when most oysters from the Chesapeake Bay were harvested by tongers in small flat bottomed row boats (who used long tongs to pull oysters from the bottom), or dredged by sail powered
During World War II
At the start of World War II German
One of these boats blew up while docked at Cape Charles killing some of its crew. The explosion was believed by many locals to have been the work of German saboteurs, possibly put ashore by a passing U-boat, who were believed to be in the area but this was never proven.
When the war ended, the boats were returned to their former owners.
Decline of the oyster industry
Only a few buyboats were built after World War II. This was due to vast improvements to transportation infrastructure in the region during the 1950s when most water-borne commerce moved to highways, and the rapid decline of the Chesapeake Bay oyster industry due to decades of over-harvesting and oyster diseases
Buyboats in the 21st century
By 2013 only one buyboat, the Delvin K,
Most of the vessels of this type that are still afloat have found completely new lives as museum pieces, yachts, floating classrooms, and dive charter boats, a few in places far from the Chesapeake Bay such as the
References
- ^ ISBN 978-0738592350. Retrieved December 11, 2012.
- ISBN 0393046605. Retrieved December 11, 2012.
buy-boat.
- ISBN 0801852498. Retrieved December 11, 2012.
- ^ The Last Chesapeake Bay Buyboat in Virginia, the Delvin K - richmond.com
- ^ a b Photos and Information on the Northern & Southern Oyster Buyboats Still in the Chesapeake Bay & South, oysterbuyboats.com
- ^ a b BUY BOATS COME HOME TO URBANNA THIS WEEKEND, dailypress.com
- ^ 12th Annual Buyboat Reunion at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum (2016), cbmm.org
- ^ Nellie Crockett, Buy-Boat Stewardship, October 29, 2013, towndock.net