Elissa (ship)

Elissa
History
United States
Name	Elissa
Operator	Galveston Historical Foundation
Builder	Alexander Hall & Co. Aberdeen, Scotland
Launched	27 October 1877
Identification	IMO number: 5072060 MMSI number: 367066790 Callsign: WSD3050
Status	Training ship
General characteristics
Tonnage	431 GRT 409 NRT
Length	141 ft (43 m)
Beam	28 ft (8.5 m)
Draft	10 ft 6 in (3.20 m) .
Sail plan	three-masted barque, 19 sails
Capacity	430 tons cargo
Elissa
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Elissa Elissa
Location	Galveston Historic Seaport, Galveston, Texas
Coordinates	29°18′34″N 94°47′37″W
Built	1877 (1877)
Architect	Alexander Hall & Sons
Architectural style	Three-masted Barque
Website	1877 Tall Ship Elissa
NRHP reference No.	78002930
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	March 21, 1978
Designated NHL	December 14, 1990

The tall ship Elissa is a three-masted barque. She is based in Galveston, Texas, and is one of the oldest ships sailing today. Launched in 1877, she is now a museum ship at the Texas Seaport Museum. She was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1990. The Texas Legislature designated Elissa the official tall ship of Texas in 2005.

History

The foremast of the Elissa

Elissa was built in Aberdeen, Scotland as a merchant vessel in a time when steamships were overtaking sailing ships. She was launched on October 27, 1877. The vessel was named for the niece of Henry Fowler Watt, Elissa's first owner, though according to his descendants the ship was named for the Queen of Carthage, Elissa (more commonly called Dido), Aeneas' tragic lover in the epic poem The Aeneid.

Elissa also sailed under Norwegian and Swedish flags. In Norway she was known as the Fjeld of Tønsberg and her master was Captain Herman Andersen. In Sweden her name was Gustav of Gothenburg. In 1918, she was converted into a two-masted brigantine and an engine was installed. She was sold to Finland in 1930 (owned by Gustaf Erikson to 1942) and reconverted into a schooner. In 1959, she was sold to Greece, and successively sailed under the names Christophoros, in 1967 as Achaeos, and in 1969 as Pioneer. In 1970, she was rescued from destruction in Piraeus after being purchased for the San Francisco Maritime Museum. However, she languished in a salvage yard in Piraeus until she was purchased for $40,000, in 1975, by the Galveston Historical Foundation, her current owners. In 1979, after a year in Greece having repairs done to her hull, Elissa was first towed to Gibraltar. There, she was prepared for an ocean tow by Captain Jim Currie of the New Orleans surveyors J.K. Tynan International. The restoration process continued until she was ready for tow on June 7, 1979.

Elissa has an iron hull, and the pin rail and bright work is made of teak. Her masts are Douglas fir from Oregon, and her 19 sails were made in Maine. She has survived numerous modifications including installation of an engine, and the incremental removal of all her rigging and masts.

Elissa made her first voyage as a restored sailing ship in 1985, traveling to Corpus Christi, Texas. In Freeport the crew was joined by seventh grader Jerry Diegel and Betty Rusk, his history and English teacher, after Diegel won an essay contest on the history of the Elissa. A year later, she sailed to New York City to take part in the Statue of Liberty's centennial celebrations. When she's not sailing, Elissa is moored at the Texas Seaport Museum in Galveston. Public tours are available year-round-provided she is not out sailing. The ship is sailed and maintained by qualified volunteers from around the nation.

The tall ship Elissa

In July 2011, the U.S. Coast Guard declared Elissa to be "not seaworthy." The Coast Guard inspection in 2011 revealed a corroded hull. The tall ship is inspected twice every five years, said John Schaumburg, museum assistant director. The 2011 inspection uncovered the worst corrosion since the tall ship was rebuilt in 1982, he said. Texas Seaport Museum raised the $3 million that paid for hull replacement and other long-overdue maintenance projects, finishing in January 2013. The museum also replaced the 22,000 board feet of Douglas fir decking and building new quarterdeck furniture out of high quality teak. Elissa returned to sailing once again in March 2014. She ran a series of daily sails for a period of two weeks out of her home port of Galveston.

Elissa remains one of the world's oldest sailing hulls still in operation. The oldest is the coasting schooner Lewis R. French, launched in 1871 in Christmas Cove, Maine. She still sails as part of the windjammer fleet out of Camden, Maine.

Honors

• National Register of Historic Places - first object granted this status while outside United States territory
• National Historic Landmark
• Named state Tall Ship by act of legislature in 2005

See also

• List of National Historic Landmarks in Texas
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Galveston County, Texas

References

• Delgado, James P. (8 January 1990). "National Register of Historic Places Registration Form / Elissa" (pdf). National Park Service. Retrieved 30 August 2012. Accompanying six photos.

External links

• Elissa InfoPage
• Elissa Handbook of Texas Online