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Schooner Rose
Dorothea Wins Lipton Cup
The Advocate, Thursday, August 8, 1907
Hurrah! Hooray! Hurroo!!!
Provincetown wins the Lipton Cup – most magnificent ocean racing trophy
competed on for years. If ever before, and the good Schooner Rose Dorothea,
pride of Provincetown and idol of the West End, did the trick.
Provincetown has cause for “hollering” this time, for even if the
crippled winner had been crippled to an extent necessitating her dropping out
of the race, Provincetown would have won just the same, her other contesting
schooner trawler – the swift Jessie Costa finishing more than a half-hour
ahead of the James W. Parker of Gloucester, the only other competitor in the
first class.
Probably the Parker wasn’t really sailed with the expectation of winning
even second place – her great distance in the rear at the termination
of the race indicating lack of determined effort on the part of the crew rather
than lack of speed of schooner. Without doubt the Parker was entered merely
to give the meet a true racing semblance.
It was expected that many vessels would compete in the long heralded contest,
and fishermen generally were astonished, even disgusted to learn that only
five of the twenty-seven vessels listed as entering came to the scratch in
the end. They wonder if the racing spirit of the rank and file of New England
skippers has died. Here was a trophy of beauty and value sufficient to fire
the ordinary skipper’s heart, and lead him to fight for its possession.
As an excuse for the non-appearance of the great number of crack craft slated
as probably participants, it is stated that crews were unwilling to quit fishing
operations, cessation of fishing work entailing revenue stoppage. That may
be the reason. Anyway, five crews, appreciating Lipton’s and Boston’s
generosity, came to the starting line on time and succeeded in sailing a race
that aroused the admiration of all beholders.
Considering the distance sailed, the race was sufficiently close in both classes
to keep spectators guessing at many stages of the struggle.
The Rose Dorothea led the Jessie Costa over the finish line by two minutes
and thirty-four seconds; the Costa finished thirty-one minutes and four seconds
ahead of the Parker.
In the second class, the Francis P. Mesquita beat the Helen R. Thomas by two
minutes. In each class, the victor led the next arriving competitor by far
less than the winning time of the ordinary international yacht race.
But the great Lipton trophy and $1,100 of the $1,300 offered as cash prizes
for vessels of the first class came our way, $650 to the Rose Dorothea and
$450 to the Jessie Costa. If the Annie Perry had also sailed in that race,
it is dollars to doughnuts that every first class prize would have fallen to
Provincetown that day, for the Annie Perry, properly sailed, in weather such
as prevailed August 1st, is a dangerous antagonist – one of the speediest
windward workers in all the New England fleet.
All day Friday the West End was in a festive mood, canopies of bunting, flaunting
flags and sheaves of new brooms adorning buildings and overhanging Commercial
Street between Lancy’s corner and West Vine Street district, where Capt.
Perry of the saucy Rose Dorothea, victor in the fishermen’s race off
Boston and winner of the magnificent Lipton Cup.
Then, at five-thirty afternoon, the victonrious schooner arrived from the scene
of conquest, and a portion of the flood of enthusiasm that was being curbed
for utilization later burst its barrier at one corner and overflowed the harbor,
where flags and burgees suddenly blossomed at the trucks of anchored shipping,
crews cheered madly and crank fog-horns sang a hoarse welcoming chorus as the
queenly Rose swept to her anchorage, crippled forward, but decked in bunting
at the after end.
Capt. Perry was not on board, he having stayed behind to endure the ordeal
of cup presentation, an ordeal more dreaded by that modest and silent skipper
than lee shore perils in a winter’s smother, but he came Saturday, on
steamer Cape Cod, receiving an ovation here such as was never before accorded
a citizen of the town.
Unsuspecting any assault on his peace of mind, Capt. Perry stepped from the
steamer’s gang plank into the heart of a crowd of fully six hundred silent
citizens. Then he was grasped on either side by Selectman Allen and patrolman
Kelley, while simultaneously the waiting crowd gave vent to a stunning cheer.
Bedlam then broke loose. Men, women and children stampeded Perry-ward, eager
to clasp his hand, but his supporters ran him hastily to a waiting three-seater
and without delay moved up the pier, en route for his swelling – but
not unattended.
From some place adjacent the Provincetown brass band stepped into line ahead
of the carriage, which contained the sup-winning skipper and the board of selectmen,
striking up an inspiring march on the instant, as if by magic, a score of tin-horn
bearers and a like number of new broom wielders appeared at the carriage’s
rear, falling into line and step with the precision and celerity of veteran
paraders, and the triumphal march was on, led by a squad of uniformed police.
Behind, before and beside the carriage and escort, hundreds of people trudged,
jostled and jostling up the long pier and into the main street.
That homeward ride was of a continuous ovation nature, an unending roar of
applause and exclamation ensuing, except at two points: opposite Adams market,
where the captain was the recipient of an address of eulogy from John Adams
and a basket of choice fruit from the market employees, and at the Beacon office
where Mrs. Cora Fuller, the editor, becomingly gowned, presented a handsome
floral tribute to the embarrassed captain.
But what an ovation! Volleys were fired from small arms at intervals by men
stationed at various points along the route; the tin-horn brigade blatted a
discordant fan-fare between brass band selections; the broomcarriers sang (or
if they didn’t they should have):
“Here’s to Tommy Lipton – yes, and Marion Perry too.
One put up the splendid cup the other brings to you.
We’ll put it in the Town Hall, within a crystal case.
‘Tis hard to down old Provincetown when she starts out to race.”
And the hustling, bustling, good-natured crowd, moving ahead of the paraders
(and over each other’s feet with the many other on-lookers swarming on
house stoops and street corners, voiced their approval in cheers for the skillful
captain, his doughty crew and the trim hull that successfully fought for the
grandest racing trophy known in fishing annals the world over.
During all of this triumphant march Capt. Perry sat speechless; but his eyes
glistened with a moisture that was hot and salt and blinding. The crowd knew
Perry, however, knew him to be a man of deeds, not words, and were content
to make all of the verbal fireworks display, leaving to him the more onerous
task of defending the cup against all New England.
“Jim” Burke was marshal of the day; “Billy” Ewell was
chairman of the committee on thoroughfare decoration, and the Rev. R. Perry Bush
of Chelsea, standing upon the lower balcony of the Perry dwelling, welcomed the
hardy skipper with words the fervor of which evoked the plaudits of his listeners
and quite reduced the suffering subject of congratulations to dumb passivity.
That night the Pilgrim Monument celebration committee cabled as follows:
"Provincetown fishermen win cup. Roosevelt attends Pilgrim Monument celebration
August twentieth. Your presence desired.
[Signed – Hopkins]”
Mayor Fitzgerald presented the Lipton Cup to Capt. Marion Perry at Mechanics
Building, Boston, Friday afternoon last and the big audience gave the hardy
and bronzed captain a big reception. Capt. Perry was also presented with a
check for the first cash prize of $650. As the cup was being presented to Capt.
Perry by the Mayor it slipped from the Mayor’s hands to the floor and
the base was bent slightly, but it can easily be put back to shape, as the
metal was not dented or pierced.
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