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Anyone interested in bringing their Hiliner to a boat show?
The last weekend of August is the annual Antique & Classic Boat Show in Salem, MA. I’m curious to see if any of you New England owners would be interested in bringing your boats to this show and having our own Hiliner class.
This is the website for the show. http://www.boatfestival.org/
Take a look and let me know what you think.
Miller Family HiLiner
David Miller from Rochester, NH sent along a picture and some great history on his Fleetstar.
His grandfather, W. Paul Miller, bought the boat from Fernalds Marine in 1957. The boat was refinished by Fernalds in the mid 60’s. David still has the receipt from Fernalds and has offered to scan it for us. In the mid 80’s. David and his father replaced the Bow Plywood and Mahogany strips. In 1990, Hurricane Gloria ripped off the windshield. The boat now has a replacement. The picture below was taken in 1988. David is in the boat with his mother, while his sister lounges on the deck. His father took the picture. Since starting this site i’ve heard many stories of great family memories that took place with the Hiliner boats. I’m always looking for more stories and pictures to add to the site.
David still owns the boat and uses it regularly on Milton Three Ponds and in Laconia.
Tee Nee Trailer Ad
This was in Bunny’s collection. I love seeing New York in the background.
19′ Hiliner ?
I couldn’t find this model in the 57-62 catalogs, so I am assuming it might have been either custom project or built prior to 56. It looks to be about 19′ long. Check out the twin Mercs..
Hiliner Factory Photo’s
Below are a few photo’s of the Hiliner factory locations. The first location is the Milton and Rand boat shop in Ipswich (thanks to Bob Porter for finding this picture). This location was later renamed as the Hiliner Boat Corp. The last location was on Hanover street in Newbury. This was the location of the Old Newbury Boat company, which built the Hiliners from 62-65. Both of these buildings are still around. Hanover street looks almost the same as it did 50 years ago. The Ipswich location has a new facade.
Hi-Liner Windshield Info
I get a lot of questions about replacement windshields. The original Hi-Liner windshields were manufactured by Taylor Made Products. Taylor is still in business, but the original molds were destroyed in a fire back in the early 70’s. I spoke to Taylor a few years ago about trying to get a replacement windshield. They sent me to www.oceandynamics.com . This company will make a replacement for any boat. It helps if you still have the original frame. It also helps if you have a lot of money, they are not cheap.
I found an alternative if you are located in Massachusetts. Rob Allison, lives on Cape Cod and specializes in plexiglass and lexan. He made the windshield on my Fleetstart for half the cost of Ocean Dynamics, plus i was able to pick it up to avoid shipping costs.
Hiliner History Letter
I recently traded emails with Greg Grundtisch, a boat builder and writer from the Niagra, New York area. He has had pieces published in “Antique Mahogany” and “Messing About In Boats” magazines. He was nice enough to send me copies of some pieces that relate to Hiliner. I will try to scan them, but i’m not sure how they will turn out.”
One of the pieces was about the Hiliner Peapod. Greg had come across a 12′ Fiberglass peopod with the name Hiliner on it. In attempt to research its history he contacted the Fernald family in Newbury, MA. The following is the letter that Howie Fernald, Son of Bunny, sent to him.
” I am Howard (Howie) Fernald Jr. I was the skinny blond kid in the last Hi liner Catalogs. Now I’m 2. My dad bought into Hi Liner Boats in Ipswich, Massachusetts, around 1957. We moved operations to nearby Newbury in 1963. An offer we could not refuse at the time for the Hi Liner property allowed us to close the doors in 1967. All the boats, tools, etc. were auctioned off at that time. All but the name and trademark. We sold those to Dave Mosely who built the Ray Hunt design Hiliner 222 for several years. They had an extremely bad fire, had bad lawsuits, and one of the Boston banks would up with the name. Boston Whaler built two of the walk around cabin boats, very late ’60s or early ’70’s. Nothing else was ever heard about Hi Liner ntil a one man operation down the Cape started making th peapod. I don’t know if the name Hi Liner as used by chance or by rights. This was fun.”
Note: the Hi-liner trademark has been used by a fishing tackle company since 1998.
We have a name. www.hilinerboat.com
Thanks to all who sent in suggestions. This was the simplest and available name.
HilinerBoat.com 