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Books
by
Herb Payson
Featuring Sea Foam
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Amazon.com
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HERB PAYSON
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GONE
BUT NOT
FORGOTTEN
We belatedly
note the passing of Herb Payson, longtime
owner of Sea Foam. Herb passed away at on
Tuesday, July 28, 2015, at the ripe old
age of 88.
See: Sail
Magazine article
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We
haven't heard from the present owners of Sea
Foam, so we cannot be sure that our ownership
and home port information is up to date.
On August 31st, 2014 we
heard from Stephen Carlson, owner of the Sea Quest.
He had recently been in touch with Ernie Copp, who
often writes for Latitude
38 Magazine. A photo of a Sea
Witch caught his eye, so he contacted Mr. Copp to
see which Sea Witch it was. As he already suspected,
he learned that it was the Sea Foam.
He learned more. Mainly
that Ernie Coop once owned the Sea Foam, information
that we at the "Sea Witch Home Pages" did not have.
Additionally, Ernie shared some great photos of Sea
Foam with Stephen and this site – while she was a
pristine "show piece." Ernie owned Sea Foam just
previous to Herb and Nancy Payson, and obviously
took a slightly jaundiced view of Herb's cruising
style and casual brand yacht maintenance.
Here's an excerpt from
Stephen's email to this webmaster:
Bill
...talk
about a small world. I'm reading Latitude 38 and
I see a Sea Witch Pic. Right away my eyes open
wide and I'm reading the story with the pic. I
can see the boat looks like Sea Foam, so I go on
the net looking for Ernie Copp. I find
him, I send him an email and he sends
this to me. Please add this to the web site...
Ernie is a regular writer in
Latitude 38 always a good story or
two. In one article he talks about Sea Foam at
berth Southern Cal and the 1964 Alaskan
earth quake and the boat hitting bottom the
marina several times from tsunami. Amazing!...
Stephen
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Edited
copy of Mr. Copp's email to Stephen,
These
are all of the digitized pictures that
I have of the Sea Foam, but they do
illustrate the condition the boat was
in before Herb
entered it in the Junkyard Derby.
You
will notice the plaited chafing gear
made from oil tanned leather, as it
wears several times as long as normal
tanned leather, and you see the
turning block and part of the
Highfield lever for setting and
releasing the running backstays. I
devised the layout and made the levers
myself.
In
practice, the lever would be released
for the Lee backstay as the boat
tacked over, and the Weather runner
would be dropped over the cheek block
and the lever thrown into place on the
weather side and no further adjustment
was required each time. They worked
perfectly, and made it much easier to
sail.
I had already traded my
ownership of the boat to the owner
of the Offshore 50, before I met
Herb, but I knew after talking to
him for a few minutes that I would
never have sold the boat directly to
him. He was a struggling musician,
and was giving that up, and looking
for a cheap way to live. I offered
to show him how things worked on the
boat, but he dismissed that as being
unnecessary, as he and his 16 year
old stepson could figure it all out
themselves.
It just broke my heart to see
how he did not seem to do one bit of
maintenance, and the stories I heard
made me sick, but there is nothing a
person can do in a situation like
that, but for sure, I was very
particular about who I sold the Orient
Star to.
I
am looking at the picture of the
galley where the kerosene lamp is on
the bulkhead. Our first trip was an
upwind passage from Long Beach to the
Channel Islands, and it was so rough
that when my wife cooked oatmeal for
breakfast on the way up, unbeknownst
to her, kerosene splashed out of the
lamp into the oatmeal, and we did not
know it until we tasted it. That was a
lesson we never forgot.
Several
boats made the trip to the Channel
Islands about then, dead upwind, and
against a 3 or 4 foot chop, was the
Great Bear, that German Canal Barge
that was around then, that was
supposed to have been Goering's or
Himmler's yacht. On the
upwind sail to the Channel Islands the
Groote Bear was the only boat that
took longer than we did to make that
trip. So we knew then
we did not have a racing boat.
The
boat was built in the Wilmington Boat
Yard, near San Pedro, a few years
after WW2. It was about ten
or twelve years old when I
bought it in 1963 and sold it in
1972. It was constructed with
quarter sawn Douglas Fir and Mahogany
right work. I met Hugh Angelman once,
but just in passing. But I did get to
know his Protégé and Associate Charlie
Davies, real well, I
believe he helped design the 31 foot
version of the Sea Witch, which was
not as successful, and was also
involved with the rather clumsy
Mayflower???? that had a low waist and
looked like it had gun ports. It was
not very successful either, but there
were a few of each around for several
years...
Kindest regards,
Ernie
Copp
Thank you Ernie!
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PHOTOS CONTRIBUTED BY
ERNIE COPP
With Thanks to Sephen Carlson of Sea
Quest |
Herb and Nancy Payson, who owned the Sea Foam after
Ernie Copp, cruised the Pacific in her for many
years. They have a wonderful web site that includes
a lot of photos. Many of them are included below,
complements of Herb and Nancy.
June 25th, 2016:
Sadly, we have learned that Herb passed away on
Tuesday, July 28th of 2015. We belatedly morn his
passing.
See: http://www.sailmagazine.com/boats/eight-bells-herb-payson/
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Herb and Nancy
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Herb
Payson is the author of Blown Away
and You Can't Blow Home Again,
two books that document their six and a
half years of cruising with their children
throughout the broad Pacific on the
Sea Foam, told as only Herb could
do. |
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After
parting with Sea Foam, Herb and
Nancy remained ashore for seven years,
but then purchased "Red Shoes," a
Crealock 34, and spent another ten years
cruising. After that they spent four
years "trailer sailing" while writing
articles for SAIL magazine. SAIL
magazine has featured dozens of Herb's
articles over the years. He began
writing for SAIL during his Sea
Foam years, and his name appeared
on masthead for thirty years.
Herb's most
recent book, published in 1997 by
Sheridan House, is Advice to the
Sealorn, a distillation of
over 20 years of sailing experience, and
advice "...written in the same charming
and funny style as Herb's previous
stories..."
Herb says,
"We're out of sailing now, but I
wouldn't trade those years for
anything."
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