Bevin’s Skiffs

Building more than boats

From Issue October 2016

Richard and two students roll MISSY D alongside ANDREA McCOY. The pink and blue boat at the right is GLOBAL EXPLORER, a Bevin's skiff built previously by students of New Bedford's Global Learning Charter Public School.

On a hot summer day in 1995, JoAnn Tschaen, a social worker, visited a family with seven children, down on their luck and living in a run-down tenement in the north end of New Bedford, a Massachusetts coastal town 10 miles east of the Rhode Island border. For these kids, the cooling breezes of Buzzards Bay were a world away; Tschaen set out to change that and find a way to get these kids and others like them involved in boating. Three years later, the Community Boating Center (CBC) was established. The Center is now situated on the shore of Clarks Cove on New Bedford’s south end. It has its own pier, floating docks, and a fleet of about 100 boats, ranging from a 7′9″ Optimist dinghy to a 23′ Sonar, a one-design keelboat.

Richard Feeny looks on as two young student fasted a side plank to the transom.

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Comments (4)

Kevin Morin says:

October 4, 2016 at 9:42 pm

These pretty little skiffs remind me somewhat of the Pete Culler’s Good Little Skiffs. The only thing I’d like to see, realizing full well this design element may spoil the BOM as currently drawn, is a bit more flam in the forward topsides. As shown, these skiffs would be a bit wet as the nearly plumb sides won’t pitch up the bow nearly like they would with, say, 12-15 degrees more flam than shown.

These remarks made because we can see the bow is down a bit with three crew members, in some photos. Of course, such a topsides panel, with its ‘hook’ of chine and sheer relative to the ‘run’ of the two lines aft, implies wider materials to skin the same length skiff. So maybe that would move the boats out of budget too much to afford?

Nice project, even a taste of the trades as a younger person could allow a person to harbor ideas of cause-and-effect in their lives? “If I can build a boat, I can do whatever I want! I made this happen, I can make other things happen.”
Bob Lister says:

October 7, 2016 at 1:54 am

We have been building the Bevin’s Skiffs for a little over 4 years at the Cape Cod Maritime Museum in Hyannis. We raised the shear 2″ at the stem and faired the change back to the mid frame which gives it a little nicer profile. We can still get three side panels from the same pieces of plywood. We also changed the center frame to 1 1/2″ square as opposed to 1 1/2″ x 3/4″ It makes it a lot easier to clamp the center frame in place and much easier for the kids to hit the center frame with nails across the bottom.
Steve Althaus says:

October 11, 2016 at 2:23 am

Getting kids to build boats and get on the water is exceptionally Righteous on so many levels!! Thanks for doing this.
Frank van Zoest says:

October 12, 2016 at 10:21 am

Bevin’s Skiffs sail well too. We changed the boomless spritsail to a slightly bigger balanced lugsail and she was really fast in the right conditions. Kees Prins organized Family Boatbuilding Days during the Amsterdam Boatshow and I was there with templates for sail panels and home sewing machines and we made lots of sails there. This was about 20 years ago.