She was a replica of the Gokstad ship of circa 1000; she was built by popular subscription from the people of Norway to take p
She was a replica of the Gokstad ship of circa 1000; she was built by popular subscription from the people of Norway to take part in the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, and the 400th anniversary of Columbus discovery of America.
She was built in 1892 by Christian Christensen's Framnes Shipyard at Sandefjord, Norway.
Dim. 24 x 5m. Height of the mast 15 meters, which carried a sail 9 by 12.5 meter
Mainsail and a jib, 32 oars, speed of 8 - 11 knots.
Starboard rudder.
Clinker built of native Norwegian oak on a Canadian oak keel.
Building cost 12.000 NKr.
Under command of Captain Magnus Anderson, she sailed from Marstein, Norway, (near Bergen), on 30 April 1893 across the Atlantic and arrived at Newfoundland four weeks later.
She then sailed to New York and through the Hudson River, Erie Canal and the Great Lakes to Chicago, which she reached on 12 July 1893. Although the tent covering abaft the mast is quite authentic, she was fitted with a jib, which was not.
32 Shields were placed along the ship's sides.
Following the Exposition's close, Capt Anderson took her trough the Illinois-Michigan Canal and down the Mississippi River to New Orleans.
Returned to Chicago the Norwegians presented her to the Field Columbian Museum, where she was stored.
She was placed in Lincoln Park, Chicago in 1920 after a restoration, and then left to deteriorate.
Till 1993 she was there.
She is presently owned by the American Scandinavian Society and Chicago Park District and under restoration at Chicago, Illinois.
(Stanley Gibbons gives her as the RAVEN, which is complete wrong.)
USA 1924 5c sg625.
source: Mostly copied from Historical Sketches of Watercraft on Stamps Vol. 5.
http://sio.midco.net/danstopicalstamps/g