Sailing Gillnetter: Admirable
Admirable at Cama Beach, Camano Island
Boat Type
Location
Year Built
ca. 1900
Beam
8.8'
LOA (Length Overall)
28'
Boat Plans
Project Sponsors
The Ted Frantz family, Paul G. Allen Charitable Foundation and King County Landmarks and Heritage Program
Website Link
Oral History
This salmon fishing boat is known by several names. In San Francisco, it is a "Columbia River salmon boat." In Astoria, Oregon - "Columbia River Gillnetter." In Seattle - "Bristol Bay Gillnetter." The earliest of these boats were built by J.J. Griffin of San Francisco in 1868, and were used on the Sacramento River for commercial salmon gillnetting. Previously, gillnetting had been done from rowboats for subsistence fishing only.
Boat Story
CWB's Bristol Bay Gillnetter, our organization logo, was born in the Northwest. It was regarded as the best design for gillnetting salmon. Admirable was built by the George Kneass boatyard of San Francisco about 1900 for the Naknek Cannery in Bristol Bay, Alaska. It had a crew of two and could carry three tons of salmon. She was used as a sail-power fishing boat on the bays and rivers of the Pacific Coast from around 1900 to the 1960s, and was restored at CWB with funding provided by the Ted Frantz family, Paul G. Allen Charitable Foundation and King County Landmarks and Heritage Program.
Currently Admirable is used for our popular Free Public Sail on Sundays, as well as school field trips with a focus on salmon.
Additional Images
