“The Lowell’s came over in 1639 on the ship JONATHAN to Newbury,” said Joe. “They were distant cousins of the king and he sent them over because he needed good upstanding people to watch over all of the rapscallions that were in the area. What they did in England were judges and mediators. The king sent Percival over here to do that and Percival came over with his children, his two sons. I come from Richard, who was his oldest, they were more the artist and seamen. Jonathan was more Harvard, the doctors, the reverends, the lawyers. William Gerrish came over, he had married Percival’s daughter, Joan. In England they had a mercantile business and Richard was the shipping part. Richard is the fourth great grandfather of Simeon Lowell who started Lowell’s of Amesbury. His grandson, Gideon built the boat that some think was the predecessor of the clipper ship. Everybody made fun of him, said it was horribly ugly, but it was incredibly fast. The king hired him to be a privateer. You will see in the newspapers, one time he is a cobbler, next time he is just a poor servant, next time he is a sea captain. Where I come from is Stephen, another son. Stephen was a boatbuilder and a sea captain.
“At that point in time, he had bought up a big chunk of Amesbury and he built a house for each of his sons,” continued Joe. “They are the ones operated out of there, Amesbury, Newburyport, and Portland. One daughter married into the Soule family. The sons sold their section off to the daughter’s husband, the Soule family, and went to Harpswell and Bailey Island. Abner married an Eaton. I believe she was from Hampton Falls. His first son was John Eaton Lowell. There were three John Eaton Lowell in a line. There was John Malcolm and John Jay. This generation of Lowell’s were the first ones that stayed permanently in Beals. John Jay married Lucy Faulkingham. One of John’s sisters, Eva, married into the Alley family. There was another Alley daughter that married one of the brothers and came down to Harpswell. Another one married into the Bibber family in Harpswell. That is when we locked into Jonesport and Beal’s Island. John Jay was mostly a sea captain. His wife passed away. She got burned in a fire. She was coming in one night and she tripped on her shawl, fell down and got burnt. Burned the house down and she was dead in three days. He dropped the girls off at his sister’s place in Gardner and the boys went on the ship. Now John Malcolm, who I descend from was one of his younger sons and everybody called him Malcolm, that was Riley Lowell’s father. He was raised on that ship and he did not like it. By the time he was 26 he just stayed in Jonesport and fished. You talk to old Ed Drisko and Ed remembered him when he was a young boy and he said nobody in Jonesport/Beals knew the bottom like he did. They said that in his older age, he would go clamming with his cat on his shoulder. He built Peapods, not a lot of them, but Riley really built a lot of stuff. He worked for Gramp Frost. I have Gramp’s last reach boat, but it is in pretty bad shape. It is the last boat he ever built. From there Riley got in with Gramp Frost, married his eldest daughter and continued to work with Gramp.
“In Jonesport and Beals I am related to about everybody in one way or another,” added Joe. “Riley’s mother was Ruby A. Beal and she was Tall Barney Beal’s niece. Her mother was Tall Barney’s sister. We descend from Manware. We are related to the Kelley’s, a couple of ways. I am not directly descended from the Alleys.”
Riley was building small boats and he fished, lobstered, clam digger, the whole gamete, like everybody else. Joe explained, “He had an exceptional talent for building boats. I have heard that Riley was just second to none when it came to joiner work, like making bungs for a plug hole. He would whittle it with his jackknife so the grain was perfect in each plug. The guy could trim with an adze to a line. He would make a stem for a boat in a day. That is really good. He became one of the head guys for Will Frost along with Harold Gower.
Will Frost was building in Nova Scotia before moving to Beals Island. Joe added, “He built some sailing boats and he won some races. He won one in front of the Queen with a sailboat and another one he had a powerboat with three engines. One of the engines blew and he was still three hours ahead of the next competitor. Gramp has been there since around 1912 and he brought George Addington. He stayed with Gus Alley’s folks and developed a real good relationship with Gus. Gramp would whittle him half models and Gus could not understand why the two halves would not go together.
“George Addington is a cousin,” continued Joe. “I think on the Frost side. It was Frost & Addington or Addington & Frost at first. They built for a while and then George ended up getting married and moving to Massachusetts. He went down to Baltzer Boats in Medford. Baltzer Boats was from Eastport or Nova Scotia before they went to Mass. The Baltzer Jonesport boats, those are all Gramp Frost’s designs. George is the head of the shop down there, when Gramp’s shop closed up in Jonesport. That is where they went first. That was during the depression. Bert [Will’s son] was obviously one of his top guys. Riley and Bert did not always see eye to eye. Bert had really pissed off Riley one day and Bert came around the corner and Riley coldcocked him. Bert fell into a can of paint and there was red everywhere and Riley thought he killed him.
“After Baltzer the Lowell family went to the South Boston Shipyard and Gramp and Bert and them went down to Tiverton, Rhode Island,” explained Joe. “They built down there and then Gramp came back and was in Gardiner with one of his daughters who owned a line of motels. He was building barges for the war effort. He was also designing boats in Boothbay. Bert stayed down in Tiverton and on Cape Cod. He designed a bunch of boats for a bunch of builders down there. Gramp is up here now and then he got a call from Gus Alley. So fast forward, ’45-’46, the war was over, now you can start building boats again. He called up Gramp Frost and said ‘Hey, I want another boat before you were done.’ They paid him $1500 above the cost of the boat at that time and Gramp called up Riley, Riley was about ready to move back to Beals and start going lobster fishing again.
They began building boats at 1373 Washington Avenue where Amato’s is today. They sold it to Amato’s and moved over to behind the Humpty Dumpty factory in South Portland. “That is where my dad (Carroll) really got his apprenticeship. He got done school around 1949 and did not go into high school because he didn’t need to at the time. Uncle Royal was working there, Uncle Dan was there, Malcolm was there, but I am not sure when Uncle Donnie stopped. He married Aunt Maggie and Aunt Maggie’s folks owned a big part of a mill in Westbrook and they were not going to have a lowly boatbuilder as a son-in-law, so they would not let him build boats. However, he would come out on the weekends and work with the family.
Riley Lowell had five children: the first child was Rosalie, followed by Uncle Royal, Uncle Donnie, Uncle Danny, Uncle Malcolm, Dad, and Aunt Evelyn. At one point, Royal went into the merchant marine at the end of World War II and Uncle Dan went into the Air Force. When they were discharged they all went back to building boats in South Portland. It is interesting to note that Gramp Frost had Bert and Royal go to Westlawn School of Yacht Design, but it is unclear whether they finished the course. Joe said, “Grampy could have done it if he wanted to because he could loft a boat, but he could not draw a boat. He wanted those guys to have a leg up. Dad said, ‘I had more an apprenticeship with Gramp Frost. I probably had the last one because I was with him from morning to night, assisting him with everything.’ They had been building together for a couple of years before Bert came back. At that point, Riley and Bert were running the show, mostly Riley. Bert came up at the time that the MERGANSER was launched. That was his first boat with them, so that was ’48. As it was coming to an end, Will was going to give the business to Riley because he had been such a loyal son-in-law, but then he did not want the business to lose the Frost name so he gave it to Bert. When Riley found that out, he was heartbroken. He had put his whole life in and he looked at his sons and said, ‘Pack your tools up we are going.’ At that point all of the Lowell’s left and they went to Gray. Built a couple of boats there and then they came here to Yarmouth, right up on Route 88. That was Lowell Boats in Yarmouth. They all worked there except for Donnie. Uncle Dan at some point, I am not sure what year it was, ’57-ish, he went and moved to Marblehead and he worked for Gray’s and later for Ted Hood. He actually built the first plug for the first Boston Whaler. Danny’s specialty was interiors. He could whip that stuff out like it was nothing. He did not have to think about it. He got done there and went to work for Bruno finishing off Friendship Sloops. Dad left the family business; I think he and Royal butted heads and Dad wanted to do something different way or a little differently. So, he and Archie Ross were good friends and they opened up Even Keel.”
In the next issue we will continue with the history of Even Keel Boat Shop and some of the boats that they built over the years.
