Perseverance

I am generally quite unpersuaded by affirmations about the character-building aspects of youthful athletic training - when the heart is strongest and the benefits of effort easiest to measure. But I took to heart the eulogy of Ted Kennedy, Jr. (see here), who said in its most striking passage:

"During the summer months, when I was growing up, my father would arrive late in the afternoon from Washington on Fridays and as soon as he got to Cape Cod he would want to go straight out and practice sailing maneuvers on the Victura in anticipation of that weekend's races. And we'd be out late and the sun would be setting and family dinner would be getting cold and we'd still be out there practicing our jibes and our spinnaker sets long after everyone else had gone ashore.

Well, one night, not another boat in sight on the summer sea and I asked him, 'Why are we always the last ones on the water?'

'Teddy,' he said, 'You see, most of the other sailors that we race against are smarter and more talented than we are, but the reason that we are going to win is that we will work harder than them and we will be better prepared.' And he just wasn't talking about boating. My father admired perseverance. My father believed that to do a job effectively required a tremendous amount of time and effort."

Here is the Fordham MO.

Ted Kennedy with novice crew in a storm - Part 1

John Culver, Ted Kennedy's college buddy, recounts his first, terrifying voyage with Teddy on Jack's sailboat The Victura, a Wianno Senior, which now rests outside the JFK Presidential Library on Boston Harbor.

Ted Kennedy with novice crew - Part 2

John Culver, Ted Kennedy's college buddy, recounts the return voyage:

1997 - Ted and Eunice Kennedy aboard Mya win the Mayor's Cup

It was September 1997. The South Street Seaport sponsored the 31st annual Mayor's Cup race in New York harbor for Schooners and wooden boats. We were there (John Collins and I) aboard my 16' North River, a Herreshoff 12 1/2.

Ted and Eunice were there. They had brought Mya down to New York for the occasion. (Here at the Liberty Landing dock in the Morris Canal Jersey City). There was a fleet of Star boats racing. (They walked away from everyone in light air.) Ted and Eunice and I chatted about the Star boats. They reminisced about sailing their Star as kids with Jack.

As the north wind died the current turned south. The fleet, in parade formation, was stalled by the building ebb tide. I turned on the motor and crawled through the fleet to get up river of the line before the first gun. We heard a diesel motor kick in and Kennedy charged through the fleet at about 8 knots to get upwind of the line.

The schooners started first and Kennedy was first over the line, with Eunice at the helm. Halsey Herreshoff in the Neith got caught below the line - and anchored. We passed him on our way south. As we neared the leeward mark a big cat boat and a small steel schooner (which had passed us) miscalculated and were stalled by a northbound tanker. With a better angle of sail we passed both of them!

In a 22 boat fleet we were the smallest boat by 10 feet yet we finished 15/22 on elapsed time (well ahead of Neith) and 10/22 on corrected time. My best performance ever in the Mayor's Cup.

Kennedy - first over the starting line never lost the lead - winning the Mayor's Cup.

Ted Kennedy - O Captain, My Captain

Two days after he received the diagnosis that spelled doom Senator Edward M. Kennedy was back at the helm of his wooden schooner Mya. "That's all it takes", he said.

O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!	5
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.
2 O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;	10
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck,	15
You’ve fallen cold and dead.
3 My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;	20
Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass