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Come join!  Get out on the water and join a cheerful horde doing boat work! 

We can also use self-directed individuals who wish to work on program development. Professionals with experience in historical research, grant-writing, fundraising, event planning, PR and graphic design, and youth programs are particularly desirable, but we can certainly use gal/guy Friday type help!  We could use IT support too!

Folks of all ages and skill and fitness levels can help. We have something for everyone.

When n Where:
Restoration work on the Mary Whalen usually occurs Sundays, 12-6pm.  Due to tightened Homeland Security regulations, namely the advent of the TWIC card on 3/23/09, it has become hard to schedule volunteer days. We need to have one TWIC cardholder for every 5 visitors. The cards cost $130 a piece, require a federal background check, and take about 4 weeks to get. We particularly welcome volunteers who are willing to commit to a regular schedule and get a TWIC card. We look forward to unfettered access to the Mary Whalen when we move to Pier 11, Atlantic Basin.

We request that shipwork volunteers chip in at least four hours during a weekend volunteer day
Enter American Stevedoring/Red Hook Marine Terminal gate at Hamilton Avenue, Summit Street and Van Brunt Street.  Due to port security regulations, we need your name in advance and you need to show a photo ID at the containerport gate.  Please please RSVP to portsidenewyork[at]gmail.com.

Preservation scanning project needs help:
When we got the Whalen, we thought she was coming with no history; but we found some logbooks hidden under the drawers under the captain's bunk.  However, leaks from the wheelhouse above had piddled into the captain's cabin below, damaging these books.  We'd like to scan all the pages to preserve the information.  We seek a volunteer to scan all the pages

Special thanks to the following:
Thanks to those who helped us get most of the parts to fix the Mary Whalen's engine: Stabbert Maritime in Seattle who accommodated the disruption of our request for parts and discounted their fees; Washington State Department of Natural Resources who negotiated on our behalf and who provided history on the Ked and Bushey tankers in general; Gerry Weinstein who donated $5,000 to pay for the parts and more towards the shipping; K-Sea Transportation who donated $2,000 towards the cost of shipping and provided engine info; American Stevedoring who unloaded and is storing the parts in their warehouse; A & P Freight who gave us a nice price on shipping; the fleet of engineers who provided advice on vintage engines: Gary Matthews, Bobby Mowbray, Charlie Chillemi, Tim Ivory, Nobby Peers, Adrian Lipp; Gerry Weinstein who referred us to engineers and whose Archive of Industry provided much info on Bushey engines and davits, Mary Habstritt, President of the national Society of Industrial Archeology who tapped the west coast SIA membership which got Ries Niemi, and Erik Knise involved; the other West Coast site crew Antonio Salguero of Coastwise Marine Design and Kris Lindberg.  Big thanks to Bernie Ente, the King of Newtown Creek, who told us about the Ked in the first place! This is all due to you Bernie!  

Thanks for research by Captain Dick Forster, Ed Drury, Thomas Rinaldi (who told us about the Supreme Court case involving The Whalen) and thanks to the folks at K-SEA Transportation, especially Rick Falcinelli, for history and documents, free towing, generous advice and donations.  K-SEA, under the name Eklof, was the last company to run The Whalen as a tanker.  To Jan Andrusky, Dispatcher at Weeks Marine, thanks for great networking and connecting us to the right people again and again.

Thanks too for special services provided by our contractors and suppliers:  Charles Deroko, Surveyor; the pump out folks at Clean Water of New York; Independent Testing; John Tretout of Amorica Paint.  Thanks much to Bernie Mellies, the marine engineer who drew up the spudwell plan pro bono. We send heartfelt good wishes to Bernie who was seriously injured during a fall on the job 9/9/09. His daughter Sarah, a medical student, is blogging his recovery process here.

Thank you American Stevedoring, Inc. for providing us a free home, electricity and labor for over two years and for making the opera event of 2007 a spectacular success.  Thanks to GMD Shipyard who provided us a free home during the winter months of 2008!  Pier D is a great sunny berth and we miss it!

Thanks to our supportive friends at Hughes Marine and Reinauer Transportation in Erie Basin who were so patient over eighteen months while we considered buying the boat, looked for a berth, insurance and a shipyard. They could have sent The Whalen to the scrapyard; but they gave us the time to find a way to save her.  Thanks to them too for advice, material support and equipment storage, especially Bob Hughes, Brian Hughes, Phil Marion and Tommy George.

Thanks to our friends and volunteers who helped, and continue helping, at critical points: the three mighty scrubbers Patti Kelly, Jayme Keenan, and Debbie Romano; muckmaid Erica Reynolds, Richard Brandt, Gary Baum and Amy Sisti, Captain Tom Teague, Captain Mark McDonnell, Julie Nadel of North River Historic Ships, Huntley Gill of the Fireboat Harvey.  Thanks for abundant advice and material from both Captain Pam Hepburn of the Tug Pegasus Preservation Project and David Sharps from Red Hook's own Waterfront Museum and Showboat Barge.

And thanks to all of you who have sent historic photos of the Whalen at work:  Steve Cryan; Barry Masterson; Bob Mattson; Dave Boone, and for newer photos and video thanks to Helen Tschudi, Blake McDowell, Jenny Kane, Bernie Ente, Frank Lynch. Thanks to Frank Hanavan for a charming painting of the Whalen based on a Masterson photo.

Thanks to Richard Fleming for sound recordings and two great blog posts about us, and to Ian Cheney for video work.  Thanks to David Bianciardi and Kyle Chepulis for top notch video and lighting installations in 2007 and 2009.

Thanks to the Red Hook businesses who regularly support us: Atlantis, LeNell's, Liberty Sunset Garden Center, Tini Winebar, home/made, Steve's Key Lime Pie.

And thanks to our dozens of volunteers! Your enthusiasm keeps us inspired. Your work keeps us advancing the ball!