It’s one thing to take an old railway yard, fire station or maybe a factory, and turn it into a museum. But what if you want to not only recall the past, but also keep the operation that gave rise to its history—moving into the future? That’s the challenge that Andy Tyska gave himself last year when he acquired the Huckins Yacht Corporation in Jacksonville, Florida. Huckins dates back to 1920. It has seen commercial shipbuilding, military shipbuilding—most famously World War II PT Boats—and of course, iconic yachts.
The challenge wouldn’t be entirely new to Tyska. He currently runs Bristol Marine, whose yard in Bristol, Maine dates to the early 1900s and whose Somerset, Massachusetts yard saw the building of wooden schooners that were built back in the 1800s.
The difference with Huckins, though, lies in the sheer volume of its history. The factory floor still holds original tools—functional drill presses and bandsaws and even obsolete steam-powered equipment. Some are still being used today. Some have been set aside to create a small exhibit. “These tools just don’t exist anymore,” said Tyska. “Just looking at how these tools worked is a study in itself. They’re art.”
The facility also holds brochures, block prints and thousands of photos—now being digitally archived—along with the original plans and renderings for nearly everything Huckins ever built. “There are hardware drawings, casting drawings, assembly drawings, engineering calculations,” said Tyska. “You know every nut, bolt, screw, fastener and piece of hardware—and its weight. For Huckins, seaworthiness and efficiency, weight was really important.”
Tyska is undertaking 3D scans—ultimately for 3D printing, of vintage components for restoring vintage Huckins boats. “You have all the wood patterns, hundreds of patterns of struts, cleats, chocks,” he said. “Bear Albright on Avocette III—he wanted to do a new steering wheel and to be able to find a similar pattern to recast one. Our plan is to be able to make an online resource so they can be looked at and studied. And what I think is pretty awesome, is that instead of actually using and putting wear and tear on the existing wooden patterns, we’ll have a very high tolerance image file that can be then used to create a wax piece that can be used to cast a replacement part.”
Ultimately, he says, it’s about relying on the past to help carry Huckins into the future. “We can’t just be a static museum. We’ve gotta have billable hours, and fix boats and do all the things that boatyards are challenged with—defining scope and delivering a boat on time, on budget. So, this history is kind of a thread that is stitched through that.”
