| TRAVELS OF DURSMIRG VOLUME IV THE ROGUES OF ST. AUGUSTINE AND OTHER SOCIAL MISFITS Chapter 48 |
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YACHTERS, THE GOOD, BAD AND THE UGLY: GEORGE AND BONNIE
GEORGE AND BONNIE FORD and their big yellow boat named Rose of Tralee. George built his own 50 foot
trimaran in upper New York State and sailed down to St. Augustine where he and his family settled in.
Hard working easy going George had inherited the family farm so when he sold it out he had a nest egg of cash that
would be enough to give him and his family sufficient means for a lovely carefree life living and cruising aboard their
dream boat Rose of Tralee.
George, a big physically well endowed man with a perpetual smile and a mostly bald head though not gray he
always had a positive disposition with his perpetually smiling clean-cut appearance.
His reason for settling in St. Augustine was that this was where his mother had wanted to live and evidently the
family tie was strong.
George’s wife Bonnie had a business of breeding dogs and evidently was fairly successful in spite of the fact that
her entire menagerie of breeding stock and their off-spring were caged inside their anchored boat where she,
George and the two kids shared the limited space of their vessels main salon with the dog kennel stench that sent
me gasping for fresh air.
It was so strong its immediate effect was of suffocation coupled with a sensation of closed-in claustrophobia.
This must have had an impact upon the family’s state of mind. Living aboard a boat under the best of conditions I
know is a huge strain for even two people blindly in love.
Well, they all survived life in their anchored out boat that was also doubled as a dog kennel and therefore I must
commend them for having outstandingly high tolerance for compromise and mutual respect for each other.
St. Augustine being the small town that it was it wasn’t long before George crossed paths with one of St. Augustine’s
most notorious wheeler-dealers.
Kind hearted easy going and totally trusting George was just the man that “Dom Trick-a-Door” was waiting for.
George went into business with the slick talking confidence man Trick-a Door and they began developing a boat
yard over on the San Sebastian River. The boatyard had previously been the old Melansin Ferro cement boat
building place so it was well suited for development as a marine facility.
Trick-a –Door immediately appointed himself managing director and became the hot shot despot dictator money
manager using George’s nest-egg money and exploiting his hard work.
Dom with his hands on the purse strings quickly squandered every last cent of George’s money he had put away for
his family’s future and cruising dreams.
Trick-a-door was like a drunken sailor on a spending spree, flushing cash down the toilet like he had discovered an
endless supply and a bottomless pit…in his frenzied demonized panic.
Faster and faster the money just had to go!
George did all of the hard back breaking work and soon the enterprise sank as it sputtered out the last of Georges
banked nest egg.
The silence of this defeated business was deafening.
George moved on and later moved off his dream boat Rose of Tralee and tied up his dreams and his dream boat at
our dock on Dufferin Street then took a night job at the 7-11. He and his family took up residence in a house trailer
with Bonne’s breeding business of caged dogs.
George’s sweet little old mother lived in St. Augustine and always liked to stop by and chat with us. This pleasant
proper and dignified little old lady just couldn’t understand how her good hearted hard working son George could
have gotten so miserably screwed up with his bungled business dealings, Bonne’s damn dog breeding and above all
leaving his fathers perfectly good functioning farm in New York.
next chapter
GEORGE AND BONNIE FORD and their big yellow boat named Rose of Tralee. George built his own 50 foot
trimaran in upper New York State and sailed down to St. Augustine where he and his family settled in.
Hard working easy going George had inherited the family farm so when he sold it out he had a nest egg of cash that
would be enough to give him and his family sufficient means for a lovely carefree life living and cruising aboard their
dream boat Rose of Tralee.
George, a big physically well endowed man with a perpetual smile and a mostly bald head though not gray he
always had a positive disposition with his perpetually smiling clean-cut appearance.
His reason for settling in St. Augustine was that this was where his mother had wanted to live and evidently the
family tie was strong.
George’s wife Bonnie had a business of breeding dogs and evidently was fairly successful in spite of the fact that
her entire menagerie of breeding stock and their off-spring were caged inside their anchored boat where she,
George and the two kids shared the limited space of their vessels main salon with the dog kennel stench that sent
me gasping for fresh air.
It was so strong its immediate effect was of suffocation coupled with a sensation of closed-in claustrophobia.
This must have had an impact upon the family’s state of mind. Living aboard a boat under the best of conditions I
know is a huge strain for even two people blindly in love.
Well, they all survived life in their anchored out boat that was also doubled as a dog kennel and therefore I must
commend them for having outstandingly high tolerance for compromise and mutual respect for each other.
St. Augustine being the small town that it was it wasn’t long before George crossed paths with one of St. Augustine’s
most notorious wheeler-dealers.
Kind hearted easy going and totally trusting George was just the man that “Dom Trick-a-Door” was waiting for.
George went into business with the slick talking confidence man Trick-a Door and they began developing a boat
yard over on the San Sebastian River. The boatyard had previously been the old Melansin Ferro cement boat
building place so it was well suited for development as a marine facility.
Trick-a –Door immediately appointed himself managing director and became the hot shot despot dictator money
manager using George’s nest-egg money and exploiting his hard work.
Dom with his hands on the purse strings quickly squandered every last cent of George’s money he had put away for
his family’s future and cruising dreams.
Trick-a-door was like a drunken sailor on a spending spree, flushing cash down the toilet like he had discovered an
endless supply and a bottomless pit…in his frenzied demonized panic.
Faster and faster the money just had to go!
George did all of the hard back breaking work and soon the enterprise sank as it sputtered out the last of Georges
banked nest egg.
The silence of this defeated business was deafening.
George moved on and later moved off his dream boat Rose of Tralee and tied up his dreams and his dream boat at
our dock on Dufferin Street then took a night job at the 7-11. He and his family took up residence in a house trailer
with Bonne’s breeding business of caged dogs.
George’s sweet little old mother lived in St. Augustine and always liked to stop by and chat with us. This pleasant
proper and dignified little old lady just couldn’t understand how her good hearted hard working son George could
have gotten so miserably screwed up with his bungled business dealings, Bonne’s damn dog breeding and above all
leaving his fathers perfectly good functioning farm in New York.
next chapter
From the St. Augustine Record 1975 Weekend Edition. John Grimsrud aboard Dursmirg anchored in
Matanzas Bay with the Lions Bridge in the background. next chapter
Matanzas Bay with the Lions Bridge in the background. next chapter