US experts in Cuba to restore Ernest Hemingway's boat
Havana, Apr 05: The boat Ernest Hemingway used to fish for marlin in the
Gulf Stream and track German submarines during World War II will be
restored at the writer's estate in Cuba, American conservation experts
said on Thursday.
Hemingway bought the 40-foot boat he named 'Pilar' from a Brooklyn
shipyard in 1934 and used it for deep-sea fishing trips that inspired
"The Old Man and The Sea," for which he won the 1954 Nobel Prize for
Literature.
But tropical humidity and termites have damaged the 'Pilar', a
two-engined Wheeler Playmate, and canvas on the cabin top needs
replacing, said Dana Hewson, a watercraft preservation specialist.
Hewson, senior curator at Mystic Seaport, a shipping museum in
Connecticut, said "I was asked to participate in the project because the
museum and myself have a lot of experience working with traditional
boats that are either restored and exhibited in the water or restored
and exhibited on land as Pilar is on land."
Hewson visited Finca Vigia, the colonial villa on a hillside outside
Havana where Hemingway lived from 1939 to 1960, where she examined the
boat with the director of the Finca Vigia museum, Ada Rosa Alfonso.
"Above all the covering is going to be replaced, meaning the outer
covering, the roof that protects the ship, and it's going to be replaced
with its original canvas," explained Alfonso.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation, America's foremost
heritage organisation, last year declared the estate, including the
Pilar and a treasure trove of 9,000 books, manuscripts, letters and
hunting trophies, one of its most endangered sites, the first foreign
property to be listed. But for Alfonso, the site is not just of
importance to the US or Cuba, but of global importance.
"Preserving Hemingway's heritage, it's not just important for Cuba, or
for the US, it's important for the world," she said.
Cuban builders are busy repairing the house and have redone its roof.
Cuba is paying for the renovation work because the Bush administration,
citing long-standing trade sanctions against President Fidel Castro's
Communist government, did not allow US conservationists to send funds
raised for that purpose, and they can only share expertise with the Cubans.
Bureau Report
http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=286256&sid=FTP
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