Since we’re at models, recall this post from two years ago with photos of a diorama in France depicting the sixth boro with a model of a Moran tugboat, the Statue, and a liner.

These photos come from Steve Munoz, who tells this story: “model schooner Evelyn, about 3 feet long, built in early 1900s by a merchant seaman from Maine, Bill Kunze.  The hull is of a hard black rubber-like material and sails made at Ratsey‘s on City Island.  Bill sometimes lived with my grandparents in Brooklyn. The model is named after my grandmother Evelyn Mae.”

“Here the boat in Lake Champlain off Velez Marine in Port Henry NY with my father and I chasing it in a motorboat. The deck gear allowed the sails to be set depending on the strength of the wind.  The year is 1962.”  So this is not an RC controlled boat.  As an aside, I love the lines on that nearest white-hulled cruiser.

“Around 1930 Bill would take my father (who was the general manager of Tickle Engineering when it closed) and his brother (who was the tug captain and pilot for Dalzell and McAllister) on a motor boat in Jamaica Bay and to sail the schooner Evelyn for a sail. Once, Evelyn boat headed for a tug towing several barges and at every gap between the barges it sailed faster toward the tow. Thankfully the sailboat survived.”

“Today Evelyn is in my home residing on a china closet in foyer. The sails are disintegrating and are very fragile.”

As to Bill, the model maker, “He would stay in Brooklyn with my grandparents when he was not at sea in the 1930s. Apparently his family owned a number of merchant sailing ships until President FDR passed some law that essentially putting cargo sailing ships out of business. Bill was not very fond of the president after that, but in retrospect the law probably more prepared the US for WW II. One day in the early 1940s he told my grandmother that he was going to the store and never returned. It was assumed by my grandparents that he was seriously ill and committed suicide. I have his personal and ID information and his cedar sea chest here, dating around 1900. I also have pics of him with my father and uncle as boys. ”

Many thanks to Steve for these photos and stories.