Here is the first draft of the beautifully written, (by an unknown writer – at this point) description of the complete construction details of the three-masted packet ship, The Orient.

I have blown up some of the writer’s personal thoughts on how fine the ship presents itself.

There are, unfortunately, dimensions that are not clear, in the original document that I received from Norman J Brouwer, Historian at the South Street Seaport Museum in New York.

I have left question marks where we need to fill in the numbers once we have confirmation of those figures.

In 1997, Mr Brouwer sent me this (unnamed) description from a copy of the Boston Atlas and says ” I am afraid that some of the numbers are still indecipherable” so we need to zero in on that document to capture the missing dimensions, somehow.

I will write a forward (an intro) to this description when we are ready to go to press, Dana, but I wanted you to have a sneak peak at the comprehensive details we have available to us. From this very detailed account we could likely have a model of the ship built or a painting commissioned if we were so inclined .

Regards

Dad

Hugh Parkinson to Gail Parkinson (wife) and Dana Parkinson (daughter)

Tags: boston atlas, dana parkinson, gail parkinson, historian, hugh parkinson, new york, norman brouwer, packet ship, south street seaport museum, the orient