Presidents Day Rerun Of A Rerun Of A Rerun Again. Why? Because No One Really Cares.
Teddy paddling some big sticks
TODAY I AM RUNNING THIS OLDER STORY ON PRESIDENTS DAY. And RUNNING IT AGAIN, AND NOW AGAIN! Like A RE RUN RERUN OF A RE-RUN, THAT WE ALREADY RAN AND RERUN. Dear lord. What? It actually makes some sense. I think. Wait, okay, let me break it down. We ran the story originally, then re ran it, and are now re running the re run. And we have tweeked it a tad, like a directors cut. But then its not really a rerun? Ever notice how Rerun looks like ruin?
WHY? Well, this seems to be a day no one really agrees on, and further more, I am including the comments so you don’t even have to comment if you don’t feel like it. See, and no one will complain. Then again if you do. Thats always fun. Oh boy..
LBJ and Fam
It’s Monday and a holiday. Shouldn’t we be out on a boat someplace? Oh wait, it’s February. What a waste of a holiday. Not that we shouldn’t appreciate our leaders, but could we have done this possibly in warmer months so we can “appreciate” them out on a boat?
LBJ and Herb
I don’t think that is Ike raceing
Taft… between meals
Hold on here, before you start babbling on about Washington’s Birthday.. It’s the 22nd. So they/we move the holiday around anyway. And it’s not like Washington and other Presidents did not like boating.
Exhibit A for my argument. I mean come on!
So, let’s start a movement. Not the kind after a good cup of Coffee varnish BTW. I mean a political movement. LET’S HAVE A PRESIDENT’S DAY SO WE CAN GO BOATING….Without freezing. COME ON, who’s on board? NO POLITICS PLEASE..
Myrtle and Viola agree BTW
Why is the extra day in a leap year in February? Why not June? Who wants an extra day in Winter???
Great point Bob. If you were going to add a day change it to more enjoyable date as part of your presidential platform
August
No holidays in August
Flag day in june
Why one day? There have been 45 Presidents to date, and while obviously no one likes them all in these polarized times, most of us like half of them. I would suggest we celebrate 22.5 Presidents’ Days centered between late July and early August.
JFK did a lot of wood boating, although not all pleasure boating.
PT 109
Very memorable indeed.
Last admirable lib. Makes sense he was a boater!
The top yellow GLASTRON pic of LBJ was a funny club ID as club member found in a Junk Yard and learned the engine was 427 cu in . Texas factory did not offer that model , but new owner finally prove special order to President.
See Matt it works, you can take the next zillion days off and just rerun old stories. You could sit on the beach for weeks and no one would know. Go for it.
The wooden, presidential yacht Kennedy used, the Honey Fitz, began its life commissioned by Sewell Avery. Sewell’s summer cottage was in Hessel, Michigan and remains in the family. The boat was often anchored up there. It was too large to moor at local marinas. Sewell ran US Gypsum and Montgomery Ward, building the latter into a prominent retailer. Sewell’s yacht served 5 U.S. Presidents.
The Kennedy Administration has a Buehler Turbocraft Jet 35 as Jackie’s ski boat. There is black and white footage of JFK and John John sitting on his lap and driving. The Secret Service used the Turbocrafts as there chase boats back in the day.
During the Johnson Administration, LBJ loved his Texas Glastrons. The Secret Service ran Donzi Ski Sporters for their chase boats. LBJ always thought his Glastrons were faster (the one ordered with the 427) but the Secret Service Donzi’s were faster, they just didn’t let LBJ know!
Years ago I read something about a Army officer Vincent Lyman who was charged with the responsibility to design and supervise the construction of the boats that crossed the river under the command of General Washington. Was he related to the Lyman family that built the Lyman boats we know today? Anybody
Looks like the boats used by Washington in his night attack across the Delaware were Durham boats. https://www.washingtoncrossingpark.org/where-washington-get-durham-boats/
Why just one Presidents’ Day? Let’s have 45 days off.
Now you sound like a school teacher with all the days off
Put you in a room full of 35 kids all day, you would need time off too. Bless those teachers👩🎓
Yeah, those so called free 45 days off cancel out the 45 weekends they spent grading papers and lesson planning on THEIR OWN TIME. Yeah, those damn spoiled teachers….
And now due to Covid, all we hear is that the kids are years behind in school….which can only mean that the PARENTS could not care for and assist in educating their children for just one school year. Yeah, those damn spoiled teachers….
The position of a teacher is not just of an educator, but also one of being a babysitter, a counselor, a referee, a nurse, a bureaucrat, oh and one that will lay down their life in a vain attempt to protect your child from the psycho with the AK47 whos right to own that weapon is more important than the right to live a life in peace. Yeah, those damn spoiled teachers.
Hey, here is an idea, if you think teaching such a cushy easy job with too many days off, why don’t you ACTUALLY BECOME ONE and show them all how it should be done.
Yeah those damn teachers.
Very well written, and very true briant! The world needs to realize this. Thanks for posting.
Tru dat!
I was lucky to charter, for a series of corporate events, The Presidents, the former presidential yacht, now … again… known as the Honey Fitz. The CEO said to me, the day I left for vacation: “come back with an idea to have a series of events for high net worth customers. Have a nice vacation”. I considered chartering a/the Concord jet (too confined and could not schmooze); a train of private luxury cars (ditto). Then I recalled seeing the Honey Fitz years earlier at a restaurant on the Connecticut River, and I called the White House; within 30 seconds they gave me the contact number for the yacht’s charter company. I charted it from Sean Kennedy and he brought it up the Hudson from W. 23rd St. in NYC to Albany. (Also docked at W. 23rd: Malcom Forbes’s The Highlander, and Al Capone’s former yacht). Pictured below is the yacht now after a major refit a few years ago by Jim Moores. I saw the finished yacht at Rybovich and it brought back fond memories.
I wish I was one of your “high net worth customers”!
Being new to this forum, and perhaps not up to speed on latest acronyms. What does BTW stand for ?
Dry docked Bill
Its a boat restore term also…Bring Thousands Withyou….or Bring Thick Wallets ….
BTW = Bring Thick Wallets LOL Love it!
BTW = By The Way
Hi Bill, its kid thing, kinda spurred on by Texting which is all about quick talk.. BTW= By The Way 🙂
“Speak softly and carry a big stick”—-Teddy
Oh yeah………detente anyone?
Any pics Marilyn on JFK’s Woody?
Presidential yacht Sequoia ? Wondering how she’s doing these days?
President Taft’s nephews built a log cabin that my friends own on Balsam Lake, Wisconsin. (It’s so cool.) He visited it on multiple occasions, but there is no evidence he ever got stuck in the bathtub.
FE Partners won a $700,000 settlement award against the Virginia shipyard on February 22, 2019, and then began the process of removing Sequoia from the railway, placing her on a barge and transporting the barge from Virginia to Maine. In September 2019, the Sequoia was first moved by barge from Deltaville, Virginia, to Cambridge, Maryland and then during October, from Cambridge, Maryland to Belfast, Maine where Sequoia arrived on October 22, 2019, to begin its restoration by French & Webb Inc for an undisclosed price.
JFK and Jackie had Buehler Turbocrafts, specifically a Jet 35 18′. There is footage of JFK driving it with his son on his lap. The Secret Service also had Turbocrafts for their fleet in keeping watch over the first family.
When LBJ was president, the Secret Service used Donzi’s as there boat of choice to chase after LBJ in his Glastron.
I had a friend who was stationed on the Presidential yacht during the Johnson years. He loved talking about those Donzi’s. He said they had 2 Hullman Moody race built 427 Fords. He said it was the best part about being in the Navy. Sure beat polishing all that brass on the boat.
“Taft…between meals.”
Back during the start of the Revolutionary War, the British had trapped Washington’s troops in Brooklyn Heights. They were backed up to the East River and were outnumbered 4 to 1. Washington summoned Colonel John Allen of Massachusetts who led a force of Massachusetts fisherman that were tasked to row the trapped troops, horses and canons across the East River in their boats without alerting the British troops. Fortunately more than a thousand troops were transported in long boats including canon and horses. Can’t imaging how you transport horses across the water in long boats AND canon and ammunition I would imagine. washington tasked hundreds of troops to make minimal noise as if the troops had bivouacked in Brooklyn.
The southern tip of Manhattan was where the troops were moved where they could regroup. Had they not been saved by Col John Allen, the war probably would have ended then as the British Navy was also patrolling the Hudson. Fortunately, that night, heavy cloud cover helped obscure the retreat to safety. At daybreak, there were still a hundreds pf troops left and fortunately, fog rolled in to further obscure their retreat during daybreak.
Wow, a lot of pretty wild comments on the original story. You can tell we were all going COVID crazy!
Wow! Somehow I previously missed all this wisdom! The things you learn on WoodyBoater! I think the stories often get better with age(not that the new stories are no good, the old stories were new at one time). You should do this more often! I laughed until I cried! The comments were fantastic! Thank you everyone!
Hey Matt you should tryout for the remake of groundhog day!! LOL I amuse myself
Comments from 2020, 2022, and now 2024.
See you in 2026 I guess?!?!?
It just keeps going round and round.
One of my favorites comes from page 84 of Legends Of Chris Craft book showing FDR sitting in a motorcade with a 4,000 lb Chris Craft sedan hanging over his head. Yikes.
Didn’t JFK and Jackie have a Hydrodyne Ski Boat? My President’s Day memory is first day of basic training at Fort Bragg, 1970. I refuse to use its new name!
Crossing the Coldwater River.
JFK had a Resorter in fleet.
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Happy 2025!
Have any of the modern president’s been boaters?
George H.W. Bush was an enthusiastic boater. Found this clip of his Donzi was auctioned a year ago. And this mention, from Wiki on Don Aronow – Having sold Cigarette in 1982, Aronow formed USA Racing Team and built the Blue Thunders, 39-foot catamarans used by the United States Customs Service to patrol U.S. waters for illegal offshore activities, especially drug smuggling. Aronow’s close friend at the time, Vice President George H.W. Bush, was a former Cigarette owner and was involved in testing out the 39-foot catamarans prior to government approval.
Unfortunately, the drug runners caught up with Don Aronow when they gunned him down on Speed Boat Row in Miami!
I read the great book about his amazing life.
Few years back a 1952 23’ Holiday was for sale and the seller feller insinuated the Kennedy’s had the boat as a yacht tender. Told this story to my brother and he concluded my boat was once owned by jfk and Jacky O. That’s how memory’s are made (up).
The pic of Washington’s crossing grabbed my attention today, due to a recent to me discovery. I’ve spent much of the past few days deep in the rabbit hole of family history research, prompted by a phone call with a 2nd cousin a couple weeks ago. He’d mentioned that our Great Great Grandmother was a descendant of the Ices, as in Ices Ferry, WV. Sixth Great Grandfather Frederick Ice founded the settlement on an island in the Cheat River, near current day Morgantown. His son, Andrew, received official authorization by Act of 1785 to establish a ferry on the Cheat River, although he had been operating prior to that date. George Washington crossed the Cheat River at Ice’s Ferry in 1784 on his way from Beeson Town to Fort Pierpoint. He was checking the possibilities for a canal from the Potamac to the Monongahela and conferred with Andrew Ice, who strongly advised against it. Entry in Washington’s diary, validates family recounting of the event. In 1932, a chapter of the Daughter’s of the American Revolution placed a monument, marking the location of the crossing.
In the PNW, OUR Ike racing… Wish I could remember about it….the hull is a replica, the airplane engine is one of 5 built at the end of WWI, never put into production, one is in the Smithsonian, this one is marinized, rebuilt, is it a Miller? My random access memory is getting full, and harder to access!
Ron,
12 Cylinder Curtiss model V-4
Picture
As a side note, Frederick Ice died in 1794 & was buried on the island. That island was submerged under Cheat Lake, when it was formed in 1925, by a dam created for hydroelectric generation. I’ve very likely waterskied above his resting place, as we lived just a couple miles from the lake during 1989-98. Boated, skied & played in the lake summers of ’95-’97. How I wish I’d known of this family history at that time! Frederick’s son & Andrew’s half brother, William Ice was my fifth Great Grandfather. William was known as “Indian Billy”, having been taken captive by Native Americans, during a 1745 raid in which his mother was killed. He lived with the natives for several years, until he was able to escape & reunite with his father & father’s family by his 2nd wife.
A few years back a good buddy of mine celebrated his 50th birthday by chartering Franklin D Roosevelt’s USS Potomac for a three hour cruise. We had a wonderful time sitting on the fan tail cruising the SF Bay drinking a few beers…. A few details about the USS Potomac:
Affectionately dubbed the Floating White House by the press, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s presidential yacht is one of the few floating museums in the country. The Floating White House was originally commissioned the USCG Cutter Electra in 1934. In 1936 it was renamed the USS Potomac and served as Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Presidential Yacht until his death in 1945. The restored 165-foot vessel, a national historic landmark, is a memorial to FDR and his accomplishments.