Community Spirit Floats Tall Ship

Boat/US Magazine, Sept, 2000 by Ryck Lydecker

When Frank Steeves and several friends decided that they wanted to build a Great Lakes schooner to reconnect Milwaukee with its maritime heritage, there were doubters. One of his law partners even decorated an early version of the Milwaukee Lake Schooner, Ltd. letterhead to show the vessel sinking.

But the vision didn't sink. Instead, it floated so high that this month Steeves will preside over the commissioning of Milwaukee's new link to its Lake Michigan history, the 137-foot, wooden schooner Denis Sullivan.

Steeves still has the letterhead as a reminder of the long and sometimes difficult voyage from vision to vessel. But even more satisfying is that what became the Wisconsin Lake Schooner Education Association (WLSEA) didn't just build a ship. It also built a nonprofit marine education organization that today has 2,000 members, 400 volunteers, 19 employees, nearly $4 million in donations and a long-term lease on one of the best pieces of lakefront property in Milwaukee.

"Milwaukee was once one of the most important ports on the Great Lakes," says Steeves, a BoatU.S. member who sails a Niagara 35. "There was really no community connection to the lake anymore and our idea was to create something to jumpstart that relationship," he reports.

Inspired by a visit in 1989 from Maryland's flagship, the Pride of Baltimore, the objective quickly took form: Construct a traditional 19th century schooner. Thousands had once plied the Great Lakes and Milwaukee shipbuilders had launched over 100 such vessels to carry the region's products to market.

But a sailing vessel for the 21st century had to be designed for different types of commerce. It had to reconnect to maritime traditions, serve as a teaching platform and generate income through charters, private parties and dockside entertainment.

The result, constructed over five years on Milwaukee's Municipal Pier and launched June 17, is the first tall ship to be built in Wisconsin in over 100 years. Though not a replica of a particular vessel, the Denis Sullivan's design is inspired by the schooner Moonlight built in Milwaukee in 1874 and captained by Denis Sullivan, grandfather of board member Jerome D. Sullivan, a retired Milwaukee manufacturing executive who donated seed money to get construction started.

On deck, the Denis Sullivan is authentic to her time and place. She carries the traditional Great Lakes fore-and-aft schooner rig with its distinctive triangular "raffee" sail on a foremast yardarm.

Below decks, however, the ship is contemporary. She is powered by twin turbocharged diesel engines turning solid bronze feathering props. The Denis Sullivan is fitted out with complete electronics and a fully equipped laboratory for student research.

Schooner Dreams

Steeves and his colleagues incorporated the organization in 1991 and set about the task of building an institution to build a tall ship for Milwaukee.

Until 1993, the organization operated from a post office box and co-workers at his law firm produced a newsletter, answered mail, and showed up at sport shows to sell tee shirts and hats. By that time WLSEA had 300 members, a newsletter and a concept drawing of the vessel.

WLSEA then moved into real offices on Municipal Pier, hired its first employee and secured six virgin white pines for the ship's masts and spars. The trees, valued at $40,000, were a gift from the Menominee Indian Nation in northern Wisconsin.

"This was our first real proof that we were engaged in something more than simply dreams," Steeves says.

WLSEA sought advice from groups that already operated state flagships, the Ellisa at Galveston, TX, the Pride of Baltimore, and the Californian at Long Beach, CA.

"They all told us that unless we laid the keel, we would never attract the support we needed," he says.

They were right.

"No matter how passionate we were, or how much we talked about our environmental education programs and no matter how often we showed off our fabulous masts, we just could not generate the interest without having an engineered part of the vessel to show," he adds. "So, we reached deep into our pockets and came up with $40,000 to build the keel."

After keel-laying in October 1995, the project picked up speed. The state Waterways Commission and the Sesquicentennial Committee provided some funding, and the Wisconsin Dept. of Natural Resources scouted for suitable white oak for the frames and planking.

Organizations ranging from the city government to the South Shore Yacht Club, a BoatU.S. Cooperating Group, provided in-kind donations, expertise and volunteers as well as money. The $3.3 million building project is funded about 80% with private donations and services.

One business to which Steeves gives a lot of credit is the BoatU.S. Marine Center in Milwaukee which arranged for WLSEA to buy electronics equipment, cordage, paint, life rafts, hardware and other gear at wholesale prices.

"I was always pretty confident we could actually build the schooner but I'm still awed by the community support it generated," says Steeves. "A lot of Milwaukee families have maritime roots and it's obvious that our community was ready for something like this."