Capt. Paul DeGaeta The boss wanted to purchase the schooner to use at a corporate retreat he had on Drummond Island (Upper Peninsula of Michigan).
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I first became involved with "Victory Chimes" in 1987 while serving as Fleet Captain for Tom Monaghan, owner of Domino's Pizza and the Detroit Tigers Baseball Club. The boss wanted to purchase the schooner to use at a corporate retreat he had on Drummond Island (Upper Peninsula of Michigan). I was sent to view the vessel at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St Michaels Maryland on a snowy, cold January day. There I met a man who should always get an "assist" for saving her, a marine surveyor with a vision that the vessel needed someone with "Deep pockets to save her." That was Capt Giffy Full of Marblehead, Massachusetts and Pizza Czar, Tom Monaghan had the deep pockets. Giffy's vision didn't have much of an impact on me at first - I begged Mr Monaghan NOT to buy "Victory Chimes" based on the neglected shape the large wooden vessel was in. Monaghan, of course, didn't listen to me - he bought the vessel anyway. The restoration cost $1.5 million dollars, and she was renamed "Domino Effect." Wooden Boat Magazine immediately took some shots at the name change - they had let a slightly elitist haze obscure them from seeing clearly that Monaghan was doing something no one else in the US was willing to: putting the money into her, to save her. I hired a delivery crew to assist towing the vessel from Maryland to Maine, where I had contracted with Sample's Ship Yard in East Booth Bay, to do the restoration. The Tugentine "Norfolk Rebel," under the command of legendary Captain Lane Briggs, did the tow. Once they made it to New York, I felt a little guilty putting them out in the North Atlantic in February, so I joined the vessel for the rest of the tow. It took us four days and I had purchased some Louisville Slugger baseball bats to beat ice off of the rigging, which we had to do on several occasions. It was bitterly cold standing watches at the wheel as the tug slowly drug us north. We finally made it and Sample's started the long process to bring the schooner back to sailing shape. Overseeing a five vessel fleet for Monaghan, and operating one of the busiest corporate yachts in the nation (More than 2,000 guests and 10,000 miles of travel a year between Florida and the Great Lakes), I initially looked at "Domino Effect" as huge pain. She was a vessel that ate up a lot of my valuable time and provided more than her fair share of headaches - for close to two years - before a single guest had stepped aboard. I hired a trusted, old yacht captain friend of mine who was coming to the end of his career to oversee the restoration of the schooner at the yard. Capt. Red Thompson was in his mid 60s at the time, and relished the job. Years later Red's wife told me that Red recalled his time on the vessel fondly while on his death bed. It was one of the many stories I would hear of how the schooner has effected people. After Red retired, I was finally able to track down one of the best things to happen to "Victory Chimes": Kip Files. I hired Kip to serve as her Sailing Master. Kip had grown up on traditional sailing vessels and learned his craft with a group of young, up and coming captains affectionately known as the "Schooner Mafia." They now operate some of America's top traditional sailing vessels. Kip also guided my transition from yachts and commercial vessels to traditional sail. I was excited what we might accomplish with Kip running the vessel. But, as tax laws for corporate vessel write-offs began to tighten, and the "Pizza Wars" escalated, Monaghan began several "belt-tightening" measurers. Eventually that included selling off his fleet. During the three years he owned her, after all the money he spent, he ended up being aboard the vessel for only 45 minutes in New York Harbor. That for a marketing event when Domino's introduced pan pizza. We were hoping Monaghan would have been impressed with how the vessel had risen from the ashes. But, Tom made the remark to me, "She isn't as big as I thought." I kind of had to agree, standing on an East River wharf at South Street Seaport. We were in the shadow of the massive profile that was the "Peeking," a 377-foot, steel hulled, four-masted German built barque made for the fertilizer trade. Of course, anywhere else "Victory Chimes" has been since, she's the vessel that has been the Belle of the Ball, but not that day on that dock. The handwriting was on the wall for Kip and I. Eventually word came we were going to sell the vessels. As time passed, not a single potential buyer from American stepped up. The only interested party was a group from Japan hoping to make "Victory Chimes" a restaurant. This was in the late 1980s, when the Japanese economy was rolling and they were buying “American.” I was reminded of this captaining Monaghan’s flagship yacht, Tigress II, when I took her up the New River to Roscioli’s Yachting Center for service. I passed by Several of the largest building on Los Olas Blvd in Ft Lauderdale, that had been purchased by Japanese owners.
Kip and I didn't want to see that happen to this historic old American vessel. Kip’s father, a fighter pilot in the Pacific during WWII, especially didn’t want to see it happen. We took a huge risk, stepped in, purchased the vessel and prevented that from happening. Our hope was we could buy time to find an American buyer.
When one of us would balk at the prospect of being businessmen, rather than captains for businessmen, we'd say "No Guts; No Glory." We immediately returned her name to "Victory Chimes." That was way back in December 1990. We have been her caretakers ever since and "No Guts; No Glory" flies over the vessel every day as part of our house flag. In 1993, she became an American National Historic Landmark on our watch. In 2003 the people of the state of Maine voted a design that included "Victory Chimes" to grace their state quarter. We are humbled to realize less than a dozen principle owners or captains have been involved with "Victory Chimes" in more than a century since she was launched at Bethel, Delaware. Personally, I think of that every time I take her wheel. It is an honor and a privilege to sail her as master. It was incredible to be aboard, with my late wife Joyce and our three sons; James, Matt and Joey, at the strike of midnight in 2000 as we ushered in the millennium and "Victory Chimes" 100th year. Both Kip and I have the sincere wish that "Victory Chimes" lasts beyond us and well into the future. We are proud of our time as her caretakers. We are proud that she continues defining her legacy as one of the most successful large sailing vessels in American maritime history. Our hope is, when we pass her along, she finds caretakers who continue to be a part of (a mostly) sound chain of ownership. Owner/caretakers who continue to make the wise decisions that have allowed "Victory Chimes" to navigate her through history. Here's to the schooner "Victory Chimes!"
