How a storied boat found its way to YK’s yacht club
verse by Anthony Foliot
The Silver Belle was a broken shell of a boat one day I found
So I took the doors and looted the drawers as it sat in the dumping ground
Cause old things, they appeal to me… and well… old boats even more
And the boat was awash in memories, and I salvaged the toilet door
Yes the history of the Silver Belle
It sure goes back a way
I haven’t all the details
But this is what they say…
The boat was built back in ’44, by Benson’s Boat Works of B.C.
It was for the Navy, during the war, and served as a Y.F.P.
Now a Y.F.P. as far as I can see, ferried personnel back and forth
But it’s all still a mystery to me, of how the boat ended up North
Y.F.P 12 ferried personnel
Between ships on Esquimalt Bay
I’m not sure of what happened next
But this is what they say …
In the ‘40s, the ‘50s, or maybe just ‘60s, there’s no one around who can say
When it plied the waters of Great Bear Lake from Labine Point to Cameron Bay
And (yet) the Silver Belle would take out fishing, the boys from the silver mine
But the facts get pretty fuzzy here cause history fades with time
Just picture the mine boss and his partners
Cruising Echo Bay
I’m not sure when exactly
But this is what they say
Then back in the winter of ‘76, some truckers shook hands in the cold
With the old man, who owned the mine, and the Silver Belle was sold
Ol’ Robinson had the Vee-plow, Dave Lorenzen at the wheel
They had each paid five hundred bucks, and were happy with the deal
Now the Silver Belle’s on a Hi-boy, with a snowstorm in the mix
Down Hottah Lake and Beaverlodge behind a six-by-six
The story’s getting stronger now
The facts are as they lay
I listened to some old guys
And this is what they say…
It was south through Dog-rib country, over frozen bog and slough
Then finally, it came through town, down Franklin Avenue
Then resting in the Old Town, the Silver Belle on blocking
Lorenzen paid an old boy to do the plank re-caulking
But it wouldn’t see the water yet, Lorenzen’s deal was trucks
So he sold the boat, to Skipper Dave, for a mere three thousand bucks
Old Skipper Dave he fixed her up
And launched her on the bay
A couple of my friends were there
And this is what they say…
The Silver Belle on Great Slave Lake was leaky, but mostly sound
Powered by a Cummins … two hundred horse, from an old army-tank he found
She cruised all the way to Barnston Bay and nosed up to the falls
She could hold her own in a big wind storm, she was steady in the squalls
But the Silver Belle never had a chance, a money pit she was called
And when she started to sink a lot, the Silver Belle was hauled
On the government dock with some timber blocks
The Silver Belle had seen its day
“She never wet her planks again”
The dock-side wags would say…
Now over time the seams dried out, the “Belle” looked far from new
‘Till the big-shots at the yacht club proposed the boat’s rescue
They said “why don’t you give us…that old boat…that you don’t need”
And the Silver Belle, she looked like hell, so Skipper Dave agreed
Then they finished the transaction with a drink and a firm handshake
And the skipper pulled the “Cummins” so he could store it at Kam Lake
This was over twenty years ago
Though I’m not sure of the day
But I phoned a lot of folks who’d know
And this is what they say…
When the Silver Belle got a new cradle, she was living pretty large
Then they craned her off the government dock, onto the yacht club barge
And so the barge was hauled around over to the Back Bay side
With the Silver Belle up on the deck enjoying her last ride
She was set up as a clubhouse, where the sailors had their fun
And the yachts-men would all stand around and drink their “Pusser” rum
She was deemed a liability
In her dilapidated way
“To the solid waste facility”
The Commodore would say
But someone got a good idea and before they let it go
They chopped the wheelhouse off the boat and installed it just for show
On an old schoolhouse that they scored for free, it was actually an ATCO trailer
And re-created the Silver Belle just enough to fool the sailors
The wheelhouse faces the west, the helm is there as well
And to raise the yacht club radio, you call the Silver Belle…
The Silver Belle was a broken shell
Of a boat I found one day,
Sure there’s nothing in the archives
But this is what they say…
