Off Beat

Shipwreck more than a hundred years old revealed in Maine after storm

Another storm destroyed several historic fishing shacks in Maine.

Molly Moon

January 15, 2024

1 minute to read

A shipwreck from 1911 was revealed on the shores of Maine by the turbulent weather last week.

The wreckage was visited by photographers and tourists at Sand Beach in Acadia National Park, where the Tay a sailing schooner, was wrecked in July of 1911.

The Tay struck a ledge and broke into pieces just off of Sand Beach, according to the National Park Service. Photographer Molly Moon told Boston.com that parts of the ship have been revealed on Sand Beach by various storms over the years. Moon said her grandmother saw the ship uncovered in the 1950s, and her mother saw the hull in the 70s.

“What makes this event so interesting is that in the last 100 plus years, masses of people have walked over what remained of the ship, buried in the sand beneath them, without knowing it was there at all,” Moon said.

The Tay was carrying about 90,000 feet of spruce planks. The crew, holding on to the Tay’s broken mast, waited for low tide and swam to shore. They stayed in the Saterlee family summer home. The Saterlees also used the salvaged lumber to build a boathouse to memorialize the wreck.

J.P. Morgan bought all of Sand Beach and another part of Acadia National Park for his daughter Louisa Saterlee as a wedding present. The family summered there through the 1940s until it was donated to the park.

The ship was bound for Boston, and one person died in the wreck, an article in the Bar Harbor Record said at the time.

Historic fishing shacks and lighthouse damaged

Other historical markers across Maine were affected by recent storms. Fishing shacks more than a century old were completely destroyed in South Portland on Willard Beach.

The South Portland Historical Society shared images of the shacks being carried out to sea. They wrote they plan to create reproductions of the more than 100-year-old shacks.

The Pemaquid Point Lighthouse in Bristol, Maine was damaged by 79 mph winds gusts. The storm destroyed the tower’s front wall and part of the side, exposing the interior of lighthouse, which was built in 1897.