alice s restaurant

Alice s Restaurant

The Alice S. Wentworth, previously known as the Lizzie A. Tolles, was the last commercial coasting schooner to regularly sail out of Wells. The two-masted, gaff-rigged vessel enjoyed some notable associations during her illustrious career.

Schooner Lizzie A Tolles was built in South Norwalk, Conn., in 1863. After carrying bricks, coal and oysters between Connecticut and Long Island, N.Y. for 28 years, she went ashore and her owners decided it was time to sell.

Arthur Stevens of Wells, and his brother Charles, purchased the schooner in 1891 even though she was showing her age. The young Stevens brothers freighted bricks, coal, coke, lumber, salt, granite and ice along the eastern seaboard. Arthur bought out Charles' share of the old schooner and, in 1904, painstakingly renovated her with the finest lumber from his own Wells saw mill. She was re-launched the following year as the remarkably beautiful Alice S. Wentworth, having been completely rebuilt from stem to eagle-adorned stern.

John Furnace Leavitt, one time curator at Mystic Seaport, crewed on the Alice S. Wentworth as a boy and always admired her. "A deep sheer was the vessel's outstanding characteristic," he wrote in his 1970 book "Wake of the Coasters." "She was painted a dark moss green from waterline to planksheer and had a black bulwark above it."

When Zebulon Tilton, a Martha's Vineyard seaman of legendary skill and personality, first saw the 72-foot Alice S. Wentworth in 1906, he too fell in love with her graceful lines. He sold his own boat and signed on with Arthur Stevens as captain of the rebuilt schooner. She was considered the fastest and most agile vessel in her class, but entering Wells Harbor was a challenge, even for her. The inlet was nearly dry at low water and there was a sand bar across the channel. On each trip home the crew went ahead in a yawl boat and buoyed the changeable harbor with stakes before poling the motor less Wentworth into port. She waited in Kittery for a month in 1910 before conditions allowed her to enter Wells Harbor.

Tilton finally purchased his beloved Alice S. Wentworth in 1921 and successfully sailed her out of Martha's Vineyard for a decade, but in the early 1930s, his bills got ahead of him. He was in danger of losing her. Some Vineyard summer visitors formed a corporation to save the old schooner and Tilton's livelihood. The corporation, which included Broadway actress Katherine Cornell, nationally syndicated cartoonist Denys Wortman and Hollywood actor, James Cagney, raised more than enough money to purchase the schooner for $701.

Cagney was having contract trouble with Warner Brothers over their unauthorized release of the movie "Ceiling Zero." He filed suit against the studio and went into hiding for six months on Martha's Vineyard. The movie star fell in love with the Vineyard and the Alice S. Wentworth, upon which he happily spent many exile hours. The schooner, with her charismatic captain and her star-studded associations, became world-famous.

Captain Tilton's eyesight failed in 1943 and the corporation sold the Alice S. Wentworth to Captain Parker Hall. After World War II she returned to the Maine coast and was refitted for pleasure, sailing weekly windjammer cruises out of Boothbay and Portland Harbor until 1960.

The Alice S. Wentworth was almost 100 years old and leaking profusely in 1961 when the Lowell Sun reported that "Ann White, a sedate landlubber nearing 40 got so tired of waiting for her ship to come in that she just went out and bought it." She didn't know port from starboard, but had always dreamed of going to sea. As a maritime history buff, Ann knew that the Wentworth was reborn at the age of 40, so when the schooner was advertised for sale she took it as a sign. She quit her job and sank her life savings into the Alice S. Wentworth. After a few years she found herself in over her head; figuratively and literally.

Anthony Athanas, owner of Anthony's Pier 4 Restaurant in Boston, purchased the schooner in 1965 for $13,500 at a U.S. Marshall's sale and docked her at the restaurant for his patrons to admire. During the decade that followed she sank four times. Each time, at great expense. Anthony hauled her up and filled her hull with bales of Styrofoam to keep her afloat. The beautiful Alice S. Wentworth, the last commercial coasting schooner to sail the New England coast, finally broke apart in a 1974 storm at the impressive age of 111 years old.