MEMORIAL DAY MEMORIES

May 25, 2008 Blog

This is a time for remembering our military and veterans who have or still are serving us and our country. I salute them!

I have many cherished memories connected to this special holiday. First of all, my parents met each other at Camp Okanikon on Memorial Day and they later got married on Memorial Day. For that reason, we did special things as a family on Memorial Day, like go to the beach and get sunburned. In fact, my first beach date with Verna (my wife of 45 years) ended up that way. We couldn't touch each other for days! Fortunately, our lips didn't get sunburned.

Memorial Day is considered the kick-off of summer, when back yard grillers are fired up and kids start getting itchy for the end of the school year. For me, it is time to go sailing again.

I have accumulated many memories of sailing experiences, a few of which I share on the pages of this website. I struck a telephone pole with one sailboat and the mast fell through the bottom of another boat. I have many more tales to tell and hope to put them into  book form someday. Perhaps I'll just publish them on this site. Stay tuned!

MEMORY BOAT

My most recent memory-making experience took place this past week. It all started when a good friend called and asked if I would like to have a sailboat that was sitting in his yard. It belonged to his son, who was willing to give it to me. He had no pictures but said he thought it was built in Sweden and the title said it was a 1986 Lofano sailboat, 19 feet in length. I Googled that information but found nothing.

I explained that I normally didn't mess with boats longer than 15 feet and even had to pay the landfill to get rid of two boats of 15 and 16 feet. I offered them on Craigslist free, but there were no takers!

A few days later, my friend had a visitor with a digital camera. He took pictures and sent them to me. The boat was nice looking and sitting on a decent trailer. When my friend said that a small Honda outboard came with the boat, I decided to go get it. My brother volunteered to go along to help with loading and driving. After a delicious meal, we returned to New Jersey. It rained for most of the seven-hour round trip but my brother did most of the driving. Thanks Dave!

I discovered that the boat had been re-titled in 1986, but the boat was definitely built in the 60s or even earlier. They used to build fiberglass boats of laminated material but today they spray it in a mold. The boat measured only 17 feet instead of 19 and according to a hardly legible tag on the transom, It was built by Lofland Sailcraft Inc. (not Losano).

Armed with this information, I started another web search and my real adventures began. There was almost no information about Lofland Boats on the web, but I found a couple of people asking about a Lofland PicNic on www.boatus.com/forum.htm/.  One person gave a link to the Rhodes website where there was a photo of a PicNic. When I followed the link, there was no doubt that the boat I had hauled home was a PicNic. The PicNic was not built in Sweden but in Wichita, Kansas.

A man named Nils Lucander also got into the forum discussion, saying his father designed the boat. I wrote Nils, asking for information and he sent me a scan of the boat's design. He also asked if I would be willing to sell my PicNic. He had always thought it would be nice to own a boat his father designed. The owner of another Picnic undergoing restoration also asked if I would sell the boat.

I Googled the words "Lofland" and "Wichita" to see what I could find, and came across a Lofland family website which contained several sailboat graphics. I wrote an email to the address given under "Contact" and received a very nice letter from Allen E. Lofland. His father manufactured boats including the PicNic. He gave me a wealth of information about the boat and also mentioned that it would be nice to own a PicNic. I discovered that we have much more in common, which brings another Memorial Day memory to mind.

On Memorial Day, 1956, I attended a meeting at Camp Haluwasa in Hammonton, NJ and became a follower of Christ. That occasion changed the entire course of this old boy's life.

I had spent a few hours in jail shortly before Memorial Day of 1956 but the judge let me out because he knew my grandfather and I promised to scrape up a lot of money to pay my fines. In New Jersey, driving privileges are normally revoked after accumulating 12 points, but I garnered 22 points for various traffic violations faster than the cops could count - and I still had my drivers license! It was finally revoked when I left for college.

A lot more than my bad driving habits has changed since 1956. For one, I have made many good memories. And for all those readers who think life without God is more fun; take my word for it: It's not! I've been on both sides and you haven't!