Some historians speculate that April Fools’ Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. In the Julian Calendar, as in the Hindu calendar, the new year began with the spring equinox around April 1. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes and were called “April fools.” These pranks included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as “poisson d’avril” (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.

Historians have also linked April Fools’ Day to festivals such as Hilaria (Latin for joyful), which was celebrated in ancient Rome at the end of March by followers of the cult of Cybele. It involved people dressing up in disguises and mocking fellow citizens and even magistrates and was said to be inspired by the Egyptian legend of Isis, Osiris and Seth.

April Fools’ Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with “hunting the gowk,” in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people’s derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or “kick me” signs on them.

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Admiral - (1) Highest ranking officer in most navies. This word comes to us from the Arabic amir-al-baka, prince of the sea; via Latin and early French. (2) A very large fid, usually used by riggers.

Devil - There seems to be no certainty of a definition of this term. However, all guesses have two things in common: it was a seam, and a difficult one to work on. Of the several definitions I have encountered, here are three:(a) the out board seam on a deck, (b) the garboard seam, and (c)any seam below the channels which sometimes had to be caulked or otherwise worked on (chinsed) while a ship was underway. It would seem that one of the last two is most likely, and the name apt.

Gudgeon - A socket on the sternpost, through which the pintle on the rudder fits, forming a hinge. Scholars differ on its derivation, as it gets confused with gidgeon, the fish. It appears to come from the Middle English gudyun, this from French goujon. pin or tenon, and could go back to Latin and Greek (but not for stern rudders, as they did not have them). Earlier spellings gudion and gudjin. (see pintle)

Pintle - The hinge pin on a rudder. The term came from Middle English, pintel, of the same meaning, and probably came into being shortly after the advent of stern rudders. One meaning of the word was pin. (see Gudgeon)

Information is from the book "Origins of Sea Terms" by John G. Rogers

This model is from David T of AL

This is from Peter G of MD

Nic's bench - Actually working on two projects. The Whaleboat was started many years ago by our customer, who got it to the point of adding the thwarts. He now wants us to finish it.

The other project is finishing up the Wendameen schooner for our gallery. You can follow its progress here: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/30159-schooner-wendameen-by-mrbluejacket-bluejacket-shipcrafters-187/#comment-859876

Al's bench - Al has finished making the 26 sticks for the Wyoming. Still has to add eyebolts etc on some of them.

To give you an idea of how large the Wyoming is, here's the hull sitting on my desk.

As part of the whaleboat I'm doing (see Nic's bench, above) I had to make oars. The kit comes with 1/16" dowels and some strip wood. I thought I'd share how to make the oar handles. First, I rounded off the end of the dowel.

Then I scored a line around the dowel about a 1/4" down with my Xacto knife.

Next, very carefully shave down to the score mark

Once the shavings are removed, I took some 220 sandpaper and cleaned up the handle

And here are all six oar handles. Simple.

At the end of this month, Saturday April 30th, there is a huge 1-day model show in New London CT. At last count there were 110 modelers registered. Did I say it is huge? The conference room is 8,000 square feet. You can find more information here:

https://www.philadelphiashipmodelsociety.com/nsmc/

In addition to signing up for the full conference, if you just want to see the models and vendors, there is a door charge of $5. We will, of course have our table set up. Stop by and say "Hi"

BlueJacket Shipcrafters