Rosa May
Name: Rosa May
Type: Combination Cod Boat and Salmon Troller. (Retired)
Length: 32 feet (19.75m)
Weight: 5.63 tons (11,260 lbs)
Hull: Fir and cedar planking over oak frames, fir keel.
Owner: Rob Hokanson
In 1970, when Curly Newman wanted a combination cod-fishing and trolling boat, he and his brother Larry built it from scratch to a set of plans dating back to the early 1900′s. They did this without electric power tools for there was no electricity at the Newman property at the time. Like the thousands of men an women who built the BC coast and all it’s communities, the Newman brothers refused to be held back by ordinary limitations.
Curly Newman came from a boat building and fishing family. They settled at Octopus Point, just outside of Maple Bay, which is just a few miles north of our own Cowichan Bay, near the northern end of Sansum Narrows. His Father, Lauri Newman had moved the family to the Point before the second world war. Lauri had worked on steamships and tugboats as an engineer, so it wasn’t surprising that he chose a small steam engine to power his first boat. He had decided quit working on the big boats and try his hand at cod fishing.
Elrose was that first boat. Just 34 feet long, she became home to the entire family. Mother, Father, seven kids and a dog. Such was the live-aboard lifestyle of the day and nothing particularly unusual for this was the time of the Great Depression. The entire family worked at the craft of fishing. The steam engine was a godsend, for the wood fuel it burned was available on the beaches by the armful and for the price of the labor it took to gather.
Ling cod was the catch of choice and the boats were specially designed with a live tank well to keep the fish as fresh as absolutely possible. The belly of the boats had slots cut into the hull, which allowed water to run freely in the well area, and so the fish were kept alive until market day. The forward and aft parts of the boat were what actually kept everything afloat. On Tuesdays Elrose could be seen tied up at Sidney Harbour where the fish were killed, butchered and thereby delivered at peak freshness to markets in Victoria.
Gardner 5LW
A 34 foot boat isn’t exactly a comfortable home for two adults, seven children and a dog, in winter time especially, so as soon as was practical and as they were needed the family hand built a whole series of new boats. They spread out the labor and increased their returns. Hard work and a bit of luck allowed them to earn a respectable West Coast living.
Before long, it was Curly’s turn to build a boat. Brother Larry was asked to help him build it.
The vessel is one of a kind and custom built, named the Rosa May after their Mother. The plans were taken and then modified from an old and set of proven drawings dating back to the early 1900′s. Therefore, she looks a fair bit older than she really is. They used knotted string to make their measurements and apparently the brothers had treadmill powered shop tools to help with some of the more difficult tasks. It must have worked fairly well, for a total of five boats were built at the Newman property.
The Rosa May is 32 feet long, 8 feet 8 and 1/4 inches wide, and weighs a bit more than 5 and a half tons. In the engine room rests a Gardner 5LW diesel engine with five cylinders giving 78 comfortable slow turning horsepower. The propeller is 27″ x 18″, four bladed and of bronze.
Rosa May – Fishing Days
The hull is planked with 1 and a half inch thick fir and cedar. It’s fir below the waterline, cedar above, which makes sense, since cedar is more rot resistant than fir, and in this case the fir is protected by the salt seawater. (Many people don’t realize that seawater preserves and protects wood. All that’s needed is a yearly application of anti-fouling paint to keep the barnacles off. It’s the fresh rainwater that falls on a boat that does the most damage.) The ribs are of steam bent oak and the keel is of the same Fir as the lower planking. Curly finished the fore-deck with red cedar, the main deck is fir planking over hand sawn yellow cedar beams. Rosa May is a very sturdy boat.
Curly Newman fished his Rosa May until 1994. He followed in his Father’s wake, fishing for cod in Sansum Narrows and struck out for new waters trolling for salmon in Georgia Strait.
Local fisherman and businessman Rob Hokanson bought Rosa May in 1995 and fished her one more year before retiring her from the commercial fleet in 1996. He nearly lost her forever when he sold her to an owner who neglected her so badly that Rob bought her back again in 2003 to save himself the pain of having to look at her deteriorate.
The vessel spent nearly a year on land at the Cowichan Bay Maritime Centre’s boat yard where second generation shipwright and boat-builder Eric Sandilands supervised her restoration and re-fit as a pleasure-craft. Today her cabin is about twice as long it was during her fishing days, the holes in the hull which fed water to the live well have been sealed. The interior is finished in mahogany plywood.
Moored behind the Rock Cod Cafe
On nice days particularly in the summertime, you can see Rosa May out and about on the waters of Cowichan Bay. Owner Rob Hokanson takes her out from time to time to tend his little collection of crab pots or to go visiting in Genoa Bay. Rosa May is still a vessel of these waters, and after more than 40 years afloat both working and retired, she knows these waters very well.
**Some reference material used to write this article was sourced from the book Working the Tides “A portrait of Canada’s West Coast Fishery” edited by Peter A. Robson and Michael Skog, and from an informal interview with Mr. Rob Hokanson.**
