Massachusetts’ South Coast was not on Paul Thompson’s radar, not when he was a child learning to sail in England’s Newcastle area nor at any time during a professional career that took him to upstate New York where he regularly raced on Lake George. But he was thrilled on Saturday morning when Seven Stars, the boat it took him the past 20 years to build in his backyard, launched from Mattapoisett harbor.
“I started dreaming of building my own boat when I was 10,” said Thompson, who had pecked away at his pet project while working as a research engineer for General Electric up until his November 2020 retirement. He had built smaller vessels like kayaks and made replica models of larger ones. “All my friends went to a kayak or Arborite guide boat. I’ve been so busy doing this.”
At 32 feet, 4 inches long on the deck and 40 feet overall, Seven Stars is a U.S. registered vessel that Thompson always wanted to register in Newport, Rhode Island, the mecca of sailing with its Americas Cup legacy. Thusly reflects the vessel’s label, but the boat wound up in Mattapoisett where Marine officers from the Harbormaster’s Office assisted in the launch that began with a prescribed number of tests.
“The whole thing with Mattapoisett is this [past] winter when I started looking for a transport company, I called half a dozen people and they said, ‘Boat’s too small,’ ‘Boat’s too big,’ ‘It’s too far’ … ‘We only ship across country.’ Finally, I got a hold of [Tom] Brownell and Cindy, and they said, ‘Yeah, we can do that,'” recalls Thompson, who sent photographs, received confirmation that transport could be arranged, and planned to revisit the matter in Spring 2021. “Well, the spring kind of dragged out, so it was the middle of the summer before we finished all the details, enough to get it in the water.”
Jonathan Henshaw, who works for Brownell, went up to Thompson’s Stephentown, New York, residence on August 10 and drew rave reviews for his work. “Absolutely fabulous, backed that trailer down in one move. … Jon’s been down, pretty much every night, to check on us.”
To assist in the transport, Thompson called on “a lot of crew from my ancient past, college days. … They all showed up, we all listed the mast to put it in the crutches on the truck. I fed them the night before and fed them beer.”
Alongside the vessel, its mast was transported in bare-pole form inside a padded mast carrier held on the side of the truck by three crutches. All the rigging was done at the boat launch site over the two-and-a-half days prior to Seven Stars’ initial test run.
“Tom was so gracious after we had a minor issue … you guys have been wonderful,” he told Brownell. “Credit to Mattapoisett, really.”
“A lovely place, too,” said Thompson’s wife Nina, who grew up in Massachusetts. “Everybody in this town is so good. So many people stopped by and made the effort.”
Passengers on boats in Mattapoisett harbor stood up and applauded as Seven Stars basked in the sailing community’s camaraderie as it launched.
Thompson said that Seven Stars, a modified version of a Mark Smaalders yacht design, makes it four such Kahuna class boats in the water. Two others are in Maine and in North Carolina, and the original is in Australia. Along with Seven Stars, three more were recently under construction in Italy, Russia, and the United Kingdom.
Seven Stars has a full cabin and a little more underbody than Smaalders’ original design, according to Thompson, who added fiberglass to all the interior partitions. To offset the added weight, he added 6 inches of keel decking to add some buoyancy.
If the boat is ever totally modernized, it will be via retrofitting.
“I’ve read articles where guys had issues with certain parts and pieces, but I kept anything like the electronics and what-have-you to today. In fact, I still haven’t fitted it with GPS. I’ve got a hand-held [device]. I still carry my sextant,” said Thompson. “All the lines are high-tech … I tried to put the highest technology into it as possible.”
By Mick Colageo
Just one week after the launching of Seven Stars she faced a hurricane, which she handled without issue. We were so relieved to see her floating on the mooring unscathed. Thank you for a great article.