October 12, 2024

mariandumitru

Elegant home interior

Is historic Chatham boathouse worth the revenue to return it to town?

CHATHAM — Nearly a dozen years following it still left city on a barge to stay clear of demolition, an historic Coastline Guard boathouse has confronted down the wrecking ball a second time.

The boathouse that stood on Stage Harbor for over 70 years was the dwelling of the famed motor lifeboat CG36500, whose crew rescued the crew of the wrecked tanker Pendleton on Feb. 18, 1952, in what is regarded one of the most heroic rescues in Coast Guard history.

When the boat is stated on the Nationwide Register of Historic Areas, the boathouse is not, and it confronted demolition Jan. 8 after selections on reuse experienced run out and the city of Hull wanted it absent.

The Chatham Select Board is considering bringing a historic Coast Guard boathouse back to town, having first relocated it to Hull to avoid demolition in 2009.

Quincy developer Jay Cashman, who moved the boathouse in 2009 in the hope it would obtain somebody fascinated in historic preservation to save it, has stepped in and moved the boathouse from Hull to his Quincy boatyard for non permanent storage. In the meantime, Chatham town officers and historic preservationists are choosing whether or not they want to deliver it home, and are wrestling with how to fork out for that in a decidedly restricted fiscal yr.