Cadets Spent Summers Aboard Schooner 'John S. Parsons'
21'4" x 9'4", 1892. Converted to steam barge, 1896; to tow barge by 1910. Owned by Frank Phelps. Foundered off Oswego, Nov. 24, 1913, and broke up.Believed to have been the last commercial schooner built on the Great Lakes.
General William Verbeck was a distinguished military officer and educator. He also served as Brigadier General of the New York Army National Guard from 1910 to 1913.
In the early 1890s, when the Manlius School was known as St. John’s Military Academy, many of its cadets lived so far away it was impractical for them to return home for their summer vacation, but remained at the school. For the boys who passed the summer at the school, General William Verbeck, president of the school, was looking for ways to keep the cadets occupied. One day in 1892, as he strolled along the wharves on the waterfront, he notice a new three-masted schooner, its snow-white paint glistening in the sunlight and its equally white sails lying along the booms. The schooner was the John S. Parsons, built in a shipyard at Chaumont, Jefferson County, by the Captain Frank Phelps. It was Captain Phelps’ second schooner, his first having been the Emma.
During the course of his career, Phelps had frequently sailed in and out Oswego. He also did considerable business with John S. Parsons, who operated a ship chandlery on Water street. When Parsons learned Phelps was building a schooner, he offered to contribute all the necessary outfitting material free if Phelps would name the boat for him. This material included sails, jibs, cables, anchors, and all other accoutrements essential to the rigging of a schooner. It represented a considerable investment, particularly at a time when sailing vessels were considered obsolete.
Phelps jumped at the offer and after the new vessel was formally launched in the spring, it was towed to Oswego, where it was fitted out. This job had just been completed when General Verbeck saw the boat. Verbeck knew he found what he was looking for. He would charter the boat if he could, and with the 75 cadets, tour Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River.
He boarded the schooner and asked for the captain. After a short conversation, in which Verbeck complimented Phelps on the vessel’s trim lines and neatness he suggested what was in his mind. “But this is a freight boat,” Capt. Phelps informed him, “and I have no license to carry passengers.”
This might have discouraged a person with a less resourceful mind than that of Verbeck. But it didn’t daunt him. Explaining that he had 75 boys he wanted to take on a cruise, he asked:
“Is there any law against your signing these boys on as members of your crew?”
“Well, when you put it that way, I don’t think there is,” the skipper replied.
So it was arranged. The boys were signed on as sailors before the mast. General Verbeck donated their “wages,” which, needless to say, left a tidy sum for Capt. Phelps equivalent to what he would have received if he possessed the legal right to charter the schooner.
The boys were quartered in the hold of the ship, which started its maiden voyages with a crew of more than 80, counting the five or six men who made up a normal crew for a vessel like the John S. Parsons.
It passed the summer cruising up and down Lake Ontario and through the Thousand Islands region as far down the St. Lawrence as Ogdensburg, and formally returned to Oswego, where the St. Johns cadets disembarked and returned to school in time for the opening of the fall term.
Everyone was happy. The boys had a glorious vacation. Phelps had earned a neat profit and had done it without breaking any law. And the cadets learned how to sail.
Newspaper reported similar summer cruises occurred in 1893 and 1894, lasting for several weeks. On July 30, 1894 a correspondent for the Utica Morning Herald noted:
“This morning the schooner John S. Parsons passed down the river under full spread of canvas. This craft is carrying the students of St. John’s Military Academy on their annual vacation.”
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