Gotham Gazette, 6/07/2004
Boat Launch
High school students who participated in the project named the boat Shorakapoc, a Native American word used to describe northern Manhattan.
"I'm still in shock," said Dahlia Perry, a mother, when she first saw the finished boat in the nonprofit organization's boatbuilding workshop. "It's amazing, exciting."
"It's an excellent work of art," said Joann Santiago, another mother.
Weber thanked the four groups who helped build the boat - students from Intermediate Schools 90 and 218, Urban Park Rangers from the High School for Environmental Studies and teenagers from Fresh Youth Initiatives, a community service organization. He said that they used recycled park benches from northern Manhattan to build the boat's interior and renewable white oak harvested in New Jersey for its exterior.
"This boat is a piece of history to the area," Weber said, because its Whitehall design is indigenous to New York City. Whitehall rowboats were used to ferry goods and commuters around New York in the early 1900s.
After his speech, Weber and a dozen teenagers hoisted the shiny wooden rowboat and carried it along Tenth Avenue. Other teenage boatbuilders, a few parents, staff from the New York Restoration Project and one curious neighbor walked alongside and created an impromptu parade along Tenth Avenue that wound behind Public School 5 down to the river's edge.
Weber christened Shorakopac with a plastic bucketful of Harlem River water and pushed the boat onto the river. The small crowd cheered when the boat floated and the teenagers clamored for rides in it.
Devin Robinson, 12, Pedro Guadalupe, 14, and Manny Perez, 13, were the first three to get out on the water in Shorakapoc with Weber. "It was cool because I got to row for the first time," Manny said. "Me and Jeff were rowing. Your arms get used to it and then they don't hurt no more. You pay attention to the rhythm of the rowing, then you feel calm. I wanted to stay longer."