Whitey launching a cabin cruiser at Harbor Sales Service, Madaket.
During the summers of 1947 and 1948, I worked for Yerxa's Boat Yard at Straight Wharf and Madaket. I was employed as a yard hand and sailing instructor. In 1951, I was recruited by CIA and was trained at Fort Benning in Georgia. I was sent to the Far East and participated in the Korea War and the early days of the Viet Nam war with the French. In 1953, I return to college and then went to graduate school in aeronautical engineering.
Back on Nantucket in 1956, Captain Sterling Yerxa approached me to purchase his boat business. I put a group together and bought Yerxa's Boat Yard. The new business was called Harbor Sales and Service (HSS). We built the main boat building for $4,000 which was $1 dollar per square foot. This location is now called Madaket Marine. Ben Perkins, Captain Yerxa's son-in-law, was the boat yard manager. We operated HSS from 1956-1966. We had such Nantucket luminaries as Sid Killen, Chairman of the BOS, Ernie Whelden, Ellison (Pod) Pease, Gibby Nickerson, Shirley Yerxa Perkins, and B.J. Yerxa Sharp working at HSS.
The photo above shows the old way of hauling and launching boats using wooden rollers and the HSS marine railway. In the picture, I am adjusting the rollers for launching Reindeer II, E. Rayne Herzog's cabin cruiser. The HSS yard was always full, and was a unique social gathering place.
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