Skipper’s Dream

In celebration of Dads and Father Figures everywhere, Happy Father’s Day!

Rocky Mountain Classics Chapter member, Kevin Anderson, has a classic boat named Skipper’s Dream. It’s a Doug Brown original built in 2012.

Kevin was adopted at a young age and never met his mother and father. As Kevin got to be an older adult, and with adoption information becoming more available, he was able to track down his biological parents. However, by the time he reached out to his father, he was one week too late. His father had just passed away.

But Kevin did meet his father’s wife, Brenda Gorman. And upon visiting the house of his father, Kevin noticed an old boat sitting outside, rotting in the weather. It was a 1962 Century Resorter. Brenda told Kevin that his father, Skipper, was always going to restore it, and bring it back to life. But with Skipper gone, Brenda told Kevin he was welcome to have it.

So Kevin was now in possession of his father’s boat. But it needed some work, a lot of work.

Kevin worked with Doug Brown to rebuild the old Century with some modifications. Kevin always had a passion for hot rod cars, and he wanted this boat to look like a hot rod on the water. Many fittings were machined to look like classic car details. The steering wheel was machined to look like a hot rod car. Doug Brown wanted the front bench seat moved a bit, and the underside to be convex, rather than concave like a Century, so that the ride was a little better.

By the time they tore down the old Century, nothing was left but the keel and the transom framing. After eight months of work, Doug finished the new boat. Since there was not much left from the old Century, Kevin and Doug decided it was custom enough, to be a D. E. Brown original. Kevin chose the name Skipper’s Dream in honor of his father.

Shortly after the boat was completed, Kevin had the boat on display at Sloan’s Lake and invited Brenda to come see the transformation. She was so happy to see the boat had come back to life. She had spent the past year going through Skipper’s things, and found a notebook where Skipper had drawn out changes he was going to make to the Century when he got around to it. Turns out, Skipper had a passion for hot rods too, and had envisioned adding hot rod car details to the boat, the exact changes Kevin chose to make when restoring the boat. And that’s the story of Skipper’s Dream!