Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – FINAL

Over the last couple weeks, I’ve been making a big push to get the Monterey Salmon Boat model and diorama done. A couple months ago, I was in contact with Tim Thomas at the Japanese American Citizens League Heritage Hall and Museum in Monterey, and they are having a special event that they wanted to have the model for. So, that lit a fire under me to get the model done.

The first thing was to get the beach done. As you may recall from my previous post, I started off with an MDF (Medium Density Fiber) board with pink insulation foam glued on top of that. I carved the foam to get the basic slope of the beach. I also carved out space for the launch ways, so that it would be partly buried under the beach sand.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 6

My apologies, as updates on this site are LONG overdue. I have no excuses, except to say that I’ve been having to do a lot of extra work and haven’t had nearly enough time for my various projects. Most are on hold, but one, this Monterey Salmon Boat. The boat model itself has been finished for months now, and I’ve been spending my time trying to figure out how to build a relatively convincing diorama that looks something like the scene in the one photo we have of the boat.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 5

A quick update here, as I finished the deck house door and fixed all the hatches and coamings to the deck, as well as the deck house. I also permanently fixed the prop into place, and made the ventilator cowl.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 4

Pressing on with the Monterey salmon boat, I managed to add the cap rail. I traced out the shape of the bow and stern, and cut sheet wood to fit these curves. The outer edge of the rail is going to be made flush with the outer edge of the hull. After painting, the whole thing will be edged with a strip of natural finished wood trim.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 3

I’m happily keeping focussed on the Monterey salmon boat and making good progress. Most recently, I had primered the hull, coamings, and deck house. I felt I was far enough along to go ahead and do some full on painting. I masked off the hull and painted the whole hull with Tamiya gloss white spray lacquer.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 2

First off, you may note that I changed the title of this project to reflect an updated date. The original photo was said to be taken after 1916. So, I changed the title from saying “c.1910” to “c.1916”, though the boat could be from a little bit later. I got a little wrapped up recently in the layout of the little deck house, which clearly shows a ventilator cowl, but also seems to show a little exhaust pipe peek out from behind it. It’s a bit hard to see in the photo, so I’m posting a close-up of the photo below.

Close up of the original image shows the ventilator cowling on the left and what looks like an exhaust pipe on the right.

Now, there’s a possibility that this is just a piece of paper in the hand of the man standing on deck. Bill of sale, maybe? But, it’s awfully straight and seems to be perfectly perpendicular to the deck house roof. Plus, at the beach like that, it’s hard to imagine a paper not curling in the breeze. So, I’m tending to believe it’s a pipe. Either an exhaust pipe or a stove pipe.

Building a Monterey Salmon Fishing Boat, c. 1916 – Part 1

If you read my ship model projects update last year, you probably already read about this project. It began with a request from Tim Thomas, the curator of a small museum in the lower floor of the Japanese American Citizen League Heritage Hall in Monterey. He wanted a model of a small, fishing boat that was used by Japanese immigrant fishermen in Monterey to fish for salmon. There was a particular boat he had in mind, a boat called the Olympus.

I originally didn’t want to take on the project, as my record on commissioned work isn’t very good. it just becomes work and something that feels like a weight around my neck. So, I asked ship modeler Paul Reck from the Hyde Street Pier Model Shipwrights if he would be willing to take it on. He agreed. But, when I asked him about it later, he said he’d work on it if I would work on it too. So, I initially got kind of dragged into the project.