How did you come to learn about SeaCrafts?

[bigeasy1]

Ok This is going to be long and probably corny,so you've been warned.

I Bought my first boat when I was 19.No one in my family ever owned a boat or fished,but somehow i ended up loving the looks and adventure that a boat gave me.
After a long period of having mostly Aluminum ones,I got hooked on the Salmon fishing on the Great Lakes,and realized that i needed something bigger and heavier for the seemingly always ugly water conditions on them.

First "big" boat (to me)was a 22'Trophy hardtop and i fished it pretty hard for ten years,but the ride and handling in the rough stuff wasn't fun.
During that Time,a good friend in the fiberglass supply business,who had built a few downeast boats,and owned several other types would always tell me that I should find something like an old Seacraft or Formula,He'd say"You need to get an old Seacraft and restore it."
He would tell me how so many of his customers had converted the old seacraft hulls into cod fishing rod and reel boats for commercial type fishing.He'd say "The seacraft hull would be good in that crappy wave pattern on the Great lakes".He would tell me how well they were built for their day and how good the ride and sea handling caracteristics were.
He is extremely knowledgable on boats and I trusted his opinion without question.

I would see him about once a week at his shop and he would always bring up the Seacraft thing.Ocassionally he'd come accross one for sale but usually they were way out of my price range.

One day I happened to be walking around the backside of the boatyard where i kept my Trophy up in Niagara county,in western NY.
This part of the yard had mostly old junk boats that had been abandoned or left there after the customers stopped paying storage fees.
You know,the ones you see with weeds and trees growing out of the rotted cores on the decks,and wasp nests in all the crevices.
Anyway I see this red boat way in the back that had nice looking lines,so I took a walk over to it to check it out,and lo and behold if it's not a Seacraft Tsunami with a hull ID stating it's a 1974.
That was it,I had to have it.My buddy thought I was crazy.What the heck is so special about this thing,and look at it,it's a mess are you really serious about buying this? he asked.
Hell yeah I said,can't you picture how cool this would be brought back to it's glory days?

So now I go to the owner of the yard (a friend of mine)and ask him if it's for sale.He says to me "That's Snakes boat,he owes me storage but nobody knows where he is"
I found out that this Snake guy was kind of a crazy guy with a bizzare reputation that used to run and own the boat,and that he bought it from a guy who chartered it out who I know that we refer to as old jammer.
You'd have to see this place,it's just full of crazy guys,the kind that look like something out of the Ernest Hemmingway period.Most of them are nice guys, but rough and tough and tend to drink way too nuch.
Well I would go back there about once a month to fish out of the Trophy and each time,I'd ask Jim(the owner)if he found snake yet.
It was always nope,can't find him.(I don't think he was looking all that hard).
I don't think he cared about getting rid of it at all.He's like so many of the places you see in the country with junk all over the property,but they won't sell it.

For three solid years I drove him nuts pushing him to find this snake guy,or take a mechanics lean on it so he could get it and then sell it to me.
One day there was a guy from the campground accross the street who overheard the conversation,and said that he knew this Snake guy and where he was.

Well,he was right,he got me the old registration and got Snake to sign the boat over to Jim.I bought it from jim without even knowing what he wanted.I called him the week before Thanksgiving,told him to get it ready to tow as I was making the six hour ride to come and get it.
When I got there I asked him how much he wanted,and he hemd and hawed and finally said almost as a question how about $1000.00 I said sold.
I immediately went out and bought four new tires for the trailer,loaded the hubs with grease and towed her the 400 miles home.
I spent the next three years restoring it,paying as i went for mostly all new equipment and have never regretted it for a minute.

The fact that I've actually had people make special trips to the marina to say that they heard I fixed up Snake old boat and they couldn't believe it was the same boat.The fact that there is not one day when someone doesn't ask me what kind of boat it is,and is it new?even better when I tell them it's a 1974 they can't belive it.And all the old time local characters who have said,"I fished on that boat".
All those things and the awesome ride and performance it gives me,and along with the tons of knowledge and help that I've received from many of you on his site,make this more than just a boat to me.

When I go up to NY and have Jim say to me "everybody who comes in here always asks who owns that red boat and is it for sale".
All those words above are enough to know how special these old Seacrafts are.They are mor5e than just a piece of fiberglass.

My thanks to Joe Merton who started me off on this adventure,and to my buddy Bob who was a huge help in the resto,and to everyone else along the way who helped in various ways.