We purchased Mahdee from Tom, a retired Vietnam war vet (Navy Seal) who was also a wonderful man with 6 children who readily says “the kids ate the hull.” The more accurate statement may be that college education for all those children took a big chunk of Tom and his wife’s discretionary income. We have heard stories about happy days on the “F” dock at Fiddler’s Cove Marina where Mahdee was berthed for so many years. These stories come from other boaters at the Cove. We haven’t really talked much with Tom about raising the children on the boat. One time he said he had “two batches of three.” He recounted for us that the first batch were swabbing down the deck early each morning when they were small and the second batch were…well…of the more relaxed type.
We know that Mahdee’s original family was big–Sandy “Skipper” Moffat had 4 children at the time he owned Mahdee and one later for a total of five. We’ve been in touch with the grandchildren of Skipper and have really enjoyed learning a bit about the Moffat family. It gives depth to our understanding of Mahdee: how she was designed and built for Sandy Moffat– this family man who was also quite a yachtsman. He was well known on the East Coast of the US as a Commodore of the Boston Yacht Cub, active member and Commodore of the Cruising Club of America and an author of several Yachting Magazine articles as well a couple of books. We know that the extended family keeps a summer home on an island in Maine–and that there’s a mooring there that Mahdee used in the summers, too. Skipper’s grandson, Banner, resides in California so we’ve had a couple visits from him during the rebuild and we look forward to future sailing trips with Banner as well. All-in-all the Moffats seem to be a big, happy, and friendly clan.
In San Diego, we’d been told that a big family up in Belvedere Cove once owned Mahdee (when she was called “Privateer”) and there would likely be children who would remember her. We also learned that this big family had sailed Mahdee/Privateer in the 1967 Transpac. So, when we came to the San Francisco Bay area, we thought it would be nice to look up this family. We were most curious if they had photographs of Mahdee/Privateer under sail and of her interior (which had been removed from Mahdee before we purchased the boat). I contacted the San Francisco Yacht Club (sponsor during the 1967 Transpac) and received a call back from Jim, the son of Dave Allen, Mahdee/Privateer’s owner during the 1960’s. Dave was a well known West Coast yachtsman, a Commodore of the San Francisco Yacht Club, and well-known avid racing sailor. We’re quite happy that Mahdee/Privateer enjoyed being owned by this yachtsman, too. Having just spent several days at the SFYC, met several different family members who remember the boat and having sailed with Jim and some members of his family on his boat as well as Jim on Mahdee during the schooner race…we can say this is yet another big, friendly clan.
We’ve met Robert, a lively fellow who owned Mahdee in the 1970’s, and have heard lots of stories from other boaters as well as Robert about his days sailing Mahdee/Privateer up and down the West Coast as well as to and from Hawaii. But we know very little about some of Mahdee’s other owners–only names and a few bits of stories. I’ve been in touch with her 1950’s owner and need to follow up with him about his times with her on the East Coast. Then there is the mysterious “good doctor” that we’ve heard about. It seems there’s a doctor who retired early and sailed Mahdee (as Privateer) in the tropics. We imagine he is the fellow who brought Mahdee to the West Coast and need to follow up on the leads about this man soon. Perhaps he, too, had a big family!
