Politics & Government
OCC Selling Off Prized Boat to Meet Budget
Historical A-Cat costs $12,000 yearly to maintain, could fetch $180,000, if sold
A piece of sailing history, one of a small fleet of Barnegat Bay A-cat sailboats, will be sold by Ocean County College to support its collegiate sailing program.
The Tamwock was given to the college by Austin Fragomen of Bay Head several years ago, according to Donald Doran, OCC’s Vice President of Student Affairs.
A marine surveyor valued the wooden 28-foot sailboat at between $178,200 and $181,400 in April 2006, when the gift was made, Doran said.
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The boat was used and sailed by the college before the decision was made to sell it. Annual operating and maintenance costs are $12,000. The boat will be advertised for sale locally and on www.woodenboatsnj.com, according to the instructions of the OCC trustees, who recently authorized the sale and must approve its terms.
Doran said the proceeds will be used underwrite the expenses of the sailing program at OCC, which pits sailors who honed their skills on the Toms River and Barnegat Bay against teams from four year colleges and universities. The is home to the OCC regattas. Plans are under way for an $850,000 sailing center at Mill Creek County Park across the Toms River from the yacht club, but money from the sale of the Tamwock will not be used for that facility, Doran said.
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“They’re historical boats, there are always people out their interested in joining syndicates to own and race them,’’ Doran said.
According to a 2003 article in Wooden Boat magazine, the Tamwock’s legacy dates back to 1924 when she was built to the design of Francis Sweisguth. Four others were built to plans of rival designer of Charles A. Mower of New York. He was commissioned in 1922 to design a new breed of catboat by Charles A. McKeehan of the Island Heights Yacht Club.
The Tamwock’s second coming followed renewed interest in the beautiful boat, and the discovery of the original Tamwock plans in a bureau drawer in an antique shop.
Peter Kellogg of Bay Head hired shipwright John Brady of the Philadelphia Maritime Museum to use Mower’s plans, not Sweisguth’s, to design a new Tamwock, which was launched in 1990. The original Tamwock was destroyed in a boatyard fire in 1940.
Kellogg sold the boat to David Alldian of the Metedeconk River Yacht Club in 1995. Fragomen acquired it in 2002.
