Finally the rigs of the Clippers were unique to the Chesapeake Bay, in that the designers made better use of engineering principles than did their contemporaries. Uncommon to the period was the fact that these ships failed to bear a figurehead, nor headboards or trailboards. The undecorated hulls of these ships were black, low-sided, and sharped bowed, leaving the Clippers with minimum freeboard. Baltimore Clippers had heart shaped midsections with short keels and raking sterns. All Clippers were approximately 100 feet in length from stern to bow. Though no two were ever built to the same dimensions or specifications they share common bonds just as the citizens of Maryland share similarities in their uniqueness. The Baltimore Clipper has many distinct features which separate it from other Chesapeake Bay craft of the early nineteenth century. From this source came the basic concept of the Baltimore Clippers, first seen in the ship Ann McKim. These boats were "sharp built", that is having a merchant type or fast sailing hull that is to be used either in letter of marque service (to engage enemy vessels and take prizes) or for privateering. One such predecessor would be the Chesapeake schooners that were mainstays of the bay industries in the late 1700's. These ships, and the design principles used to create them, were the backbone of the Maryland shipbuilding industry for many years.īecause of the importance of watercraft on Maryland's economy in the eighteenth century, the Chesapeake Bay was an area of refinement and development for shipbuilding innovations, based on both new and old ideas in maritime engineering. These boats were able to combine the sturdiness they needed to survive in rough water with the speed they needed to be competitive. Finally, from the turbulent waters of the English Channel, came tall-rigged fishing boats from France and Britain called luggers. The sloop was, according to the British definition, a single masted craft with a gaff sail and a fixed bowsprit which allowed for several triangular headsails. Also of European ancestry was the sloop which was most common in Sweden, France, and Spain. In the mid-17th century new designs came from Holland of the first "fore-and-afters" gaff-rigged sails which allowed for quick maneuvering, culminating in the type of vessel commonly called a schooner. The fifteenth century Mediterranean states of Genoa and Venice, whose ideas were later copied by parts of the African coast, built war galleys that were able to move with low water resistance and speed under sails, principles which would later be applied to the Baltimore Clippers.īut not all advancements in technology took place thousands of years ago. Another group would be the Vikings whose hulls navigated through the icy fjords of Scandinavia in the eighth century. The Phoenicians and other eastern Mediterranean cultures with their galleys over two millenniums ago learned the necessity of "round boats", a boat with a broad-beamed hull. Though the discovers of the necessity of low drag on the hull of a ship can not be accredited to any specific origin, it can be seen in the creations of the first sea going peoples. Clipper ships full#To reach the velocities that the Baltimore Clipper was able to achieve, the designers and architects looked to countries whose maritime histories were full of conquest of speed, with and against the wind. The Baltimore Clippers, like the citizens of Maryland, are derived from a polyglot of many different civilization and cultures. Since the first true Baltimore Clipper appeared shortly after the Revolutionary War, its growth can be traced as Maryland, and its maritime expenditures, develops from a British colony to a representative U.S. The Baltimore Clipper is not only the symbol of Maryland, but its ambassador to the world. Maryland Colonial Society Essay The Baltimore Clipper by Jennifer Klima
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