Harold A. Burnham

Wooden boat building is part science, part engineering and part pure artistry.  On Tuesday, the National Endowment for the Arts honored Harold Burnham of Essex, MA as a 2012 recipient of a National Heritage Fellowship.  Harold Burnham is an eleventh generation boatbuilder, whose boatyard is on land where ancestor Oliver Burnham operated a boatyard five generations ago. From the NEA announcement:

The …2012 NEA National Heritage Fellows, … recognizes folk and traditional artists for their artistic excellence and efforts to conserve America’s culture for future generations. The fellowships are the nation’s highest honor in the folk and traditional arts, and include a one-time award of $25,000. 

Throughout their careers, these artists have honored the history of their art forms while also incorporating their own creativity and innovation to carry the art forms into the 21st century. For example, Harold Burnham, 11th-generation in a line of boat designers and builders, creates his vessels using hand tools and incorporating locally harvested wood, just as members of his family did some 300 years ago. However, while rooted in the past, Burnham’s designs demonstrate his own blend of form and function.

Last year we posted about the launching of the schooner Ardelle from Burnham’s yard in Essex. A short video about the schooner’s construction:

Building the Pinky Schooner Ardelle

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