Some History
EV was built by the United States Navy in Miami in 1943. She served in World War Two as an Air to Sea Rescue (ASR) boat. The Army built about 700 of these boats during the war. Many served as rescue boats, while others collected information and provided radio interference during important actions. We working on finding out where EV was during the war.
When she was documented in 1964 as a ferry, she had had her name changed to POINT O WOODS V. She was operated for some 20 years by the Bay Point Navigation Corp in upsate New York.
She shows up again in the official record in 1989 as KOKOMOKKO for Randall G. Clevenger, whose address had been 701 Minneford Ave, Bronx NY 10464 at that time.
As KOKOMOKKO, EV was a houseboat in the Bronx until 2003. Before that winter started, her owners had turned here around so that the stern faced upstream. She went under water after being struck by a sheet of ice. Her owners abandoned her after this accident.
The owner of the marina where EV was docked, a lovely old French man named Francios, ran her ashore at low tide, patched her and put her back in the water. He tried to sell her. Then he tried to give her away. By the time that word of this boat had reached us in Brooklyn, the owner of the marina had made plans to demolish her and send her to a landfill in pieces. She was rescued just in time and brought to the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn.
Here's the info from George (but signed from Jim?--unclear; what's his surname?).
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>>>Jim is Mo's old Sea Scout leader. George is a historian that he knows who he spoke to on the phone cuz George was on vacation when we were first looking at the boat. I've added a message from George directly below.
Miami Shipbuilding was the original
builder of AVRs. Previously called Fogel Boat Works, this company had
built two experimental PTs, #s 1 and 2 (58') but never got the
contract for further PTs because the Navy decided to go bigger.
Our old boat, the old Chaser, aka Avenger, aka B-182, was a Miami boat
as was the boat I grew up on, the Marion J. Bayne. They were both
built in 1942.
All of the early boats were, to the best of my knowledge, stern
engine, V-drive boats, apparently all 9(+?) of the other later yards
built their boats to the new revision with amidships engines. These
boats were built with approximately 620HP V-12 Hall Scott gasoline
motors. They carried two twin 50 caliber machine gun mounts on the
bridge wings and were specifically designed to rescue downed pilots
and air crews. They had an on-board dispensary with 4 bunks. There
should have been 5ea 9" portholes on each side all fairly close to the
gunnel.
Probably more than 800 were built and they were used in every theatre
of WWII for rescues, special forces insertions, as picket/gunboats,
diversions (AVRs made a lot of radio noise to appear as a fleet of
ships in Southern France to confuse the enemy as to where the real
attack would be on D-Day) and for general small boat duties.
Jim
Original Message -----
From:
George Schneider
To:
Jim West
Cc: Jeff Schurr
Sent: Friday, July 22, 2005 9:42 AM
Subject: Re: Mo from the Tiki Too here.
Hello again, Jim,
My observation is that most of the Miami-built boats had the engines amidships. Based on ones I've seen, I believe only the first batch, the C9xxx group, were engines-aft, but I could be wrong, since some were modified to the later configuration.
I don't know where the engines-aft models had their number, because they had an electric panel hiding the inside of the transom. On any later units where I could reach the inside of the transom, the C-number was carved into the center vertical. In unmodified boats, it was visible in a little lazarette aft of the stern cockpit. On Army boats it wasn't there, but surviving bakelite label plates in the engine room usually carried the Army's number (starting with P or Q). Looking at the picture of the EV, very likely the inside of the transom isn't accessible anyway, so we'll never know.
If I have the identity right, C16512 was documented in 1964 as POINT O WOODS V. She was operated for some 20 years by the Bay Point Nasvigation Corp, who still operate a successor, the POINT O WOODS VII. Their current address is 9 Point O'Woods Ave, Point O'Woods NY 11706.
During the "Dark Ages" between 1981 and 1989 (When Coast Guard records were in transition between paper and computer, and lots of information wasn't available) she was replaced and sold. She shows up in 1989 as KOKOMOKKO for Randall G. Clevenger, whose address was 701 Minneford Ave, Bronx NY 10464. After that she disappears from the records, so I imagine she became state-licensed then. I'd sure appreciate it if MO could provide me with the NY license number she had after that.
If they want more information and are willing to pay for it, the Coast Guard will provide an "Abstract of Title" for $25. They can find that service through a search engine easier than navigating the Coast Guard site. Once they get to the application page, the Official Number she found is what they need to identify the boat. They need to try entering it as either 294257 or D294257, whichever one it accepts. What they'll get back is a list of owners and name changes prior to the time she dropped from documentation. Its not a lot, but if they plan to re-document the boat at any point, they should start right now collecting proof of sales that have happened after the document ends so they can prove custody. If they do happen to go for the abstract, I'd love to have a Xerox of it.
Your number of 800 63's built is reasonable. I've been using the figure 650, but the data is squishy enough that either one could be accurate.
Hope this helps. -George.
AVR History on the Internet
Home of the AVRs
STORY OF CRASH BOATS by Lester M. Adams--very good information page
Atomic Veteran story, featuring a 63' AVR
Beach Jumpers story of WWII decoy function
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TiannaKennedy - 17 Aug 2005
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AlexScrimgeour - 11 Oct 2005 -- added history and links; and a question
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PaulaZ - 11 Oct 2005 -- added another message from George with proper names; answered
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