The Trustees of the New England Steamship Foundation continue to be dedicated to the goal of restoring the 1925 Nobska to once again sail the waters as an operating museum. The former “Friends of Nobska” and the current foundation have faced Herculean tasks. A number of regulatory issues have finally been successfully resolved. We can now proceed with the restoration in full compliance with Coast Guard and American Bureau of Shipping requirements.

Three million dollars have been spent thus far on restoring the hull and another million dollars is needed to finish that work so that the ship can be floated. There lies the problem! We are currently faced with pressure from the U.S. Navy/National Park Service to move the Nobska from its dry dock at the Charlestown Navy Yard and the move plan must be completed by March 2004 (The dry dock space is now needed for the future restoration of the USS Constitution).

This is it for the Nobska. If we can’t complete the rebuilding of the hull, the ship can’t be floated, and it can’t be moved to a new berth as ordered by the Park Service. The only other solution is the scrap the Nobska. Clarence (Trip) Barnes, noted fundraiser, and Tom Carroll, Vice Chairmen of the New England Steamship Foundation, are heading up a newly formed emergency team. They are directing radical new efforts to provide publicity, communicate with local and federal governments, stimulate and renew marine interest, and most of all, do aggressive fund-raising locally and on the state and national level.
A new video “The Nobska” has recently been completed. It provides an excellent and comprehensive documentary on the Nobska’s heritage, history and restoration progress to date. The pressure from the Park Service and the release of the new video has produced an impetus to kick into high gear with renewed restoration efforts. The door is open for realistic progress.
David McCullough, our nation’s premier historian, says it well in the new Nobska video, ”It’s the last of a kind, do we say the hell with it?”