The Big 110

Folks in the Bay Area were reminded by mainstream media this morning that today marks the 110th anniversary of the Great Earthquake and Fire of 1906. The quake, estimated to be a 7.8 on the Richter scale, rattled residents awake at 5:12 a.m. and erased much of the infrastructure of the young City of San Francisco. Over at Stone Boat Yard, in what is now the Marina district, the quake shook a new 53-ft schooner right out of her construction cradle — a premature birth. She fared better than most structures damaged by the quake, as she was returned to her cradle, repaired, finished, and launched properly later that year.

Although a surprising number of quake survivors lived well into their second century, the last-known human passed away in 2015. But the 110-year-old Yankee survives to this day and will soon be kicking up her heels during the Master Mariners Regatta and the Great San Francisco Schooner Regatta. She’s officially owned by an LLC, but her caretakers — for the past 91 years — have sprung from the same growing family. The Master Mariners Benevolent Association holds their Regatta annually on the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend (May 28 this year) and the Great S.F. Schooner Regatta will be hosted by SFYC on June 11.