Let Off Center Harbor Enhance Your Life

"Rob Eddy is one of the most accomplished model builders in the United States. A native of Camden, Maine he seems to have absorbed its maritime heritage through his pours from an early age and perhaps this, in addition to a remarkable attention to detail, is what gives his models such poignancy.

Nowhere are his talents more eloquently displayed than in his recently completed model of the Augie Nielson (K.Aage Nielsen) cutter Northern Crown. Northern Crown is a signature boat for offcenterharbor.com founding partners, Maynard Bray, Bill Mayher, and Ben Mendlowitz. In the more than twenty years that she was owned by Joel White, Maynard and Bill, along with their wives Anne and Caroline, served as Joel's crew, sailing her as far as Cape Breton Island to the northeast and Bermuda to the south. When Ben first came to Brooklin to photograph wooden boats, Northern Crown was one of his earliest subjects and Joel's early support of his art was critical to his success as a photographer.

After Bill viewed the model on display in the Camden Library, he wrote to Rob congratulating him for capturing, not only the literal truth of Northern Crown but her spirit as well. "Staring down at her in all her perfection, I could almost picture a tiny addition of myself steering her to windward with Joe and Maynard trimming sheets. If it wasn't for spending the rest of eternity in a little glass case," I thought to myself, "it might be a pretty good way to stay with my buddies as well as lose a bit of weight."

  ~ Bill Mayher