REPCO — The Glass Roots
by Brenda Tredwell

REPCO’s 3rd hull, was for Frank Jordan’s LINDA DIANE. “Three brothers in our family, same kind of boat.” Dickie mentioned "JOY FRANCIS was bought last spring by "A young fellow in Corea, Ryan Bridges. He's used it all along." RP built 800 30 ft. boats from two molds (one wore out.) Quite a few 21's were built, and a couple daysailers. Sam Murfitt photo

Richard Snyder and Harold Lothrop of Gouldsboro, became interested in fiberglass when oak for horn timbers became scarce. They lobstered, and from 1954 - to 1967, built wooden boats - usually two- each winter. After Vern Charles joined them, they met with John Cousens, who produced 33 foot fiberglass Webber Cove utility boats in Southwest Harbor for the Navy. Lobsterman Olie Nestor saw a boat built by Nicholas Hemeon, of Essex, Mass. that he wanted Lothrop to use for their first fiberglass mold.

“Dickie Jordan’s the one you ought to talk to,” about that first boat, insisted Nick, a guy with the build of a man who’s hefted blocks of white oak, and catcher’s mitt hands. Essex Shipbuilding Museum catalogued the lines of his boats, but Hemeon never mentions it.

“Now there’s a man who can build a boat.” said Richard Jordan of Birch Harbor, when Nick’s name came up.

The first REPCO, JOY FRANCIS, was built for Lawrence “Gint” Jordan, Jr.(Snyder, Lothrop and Cousens called their company Reinforced Plastics Company} Dickie’s FAYE ELIZABETH was built 1975. REPCO’s 3rd hull, was Frank Jordan’s LINDA DIANE. “Three brothers in our family, same kind of boat.”Dickie mentioned “JOY FRANCIS was bought last spring by “A young fellow in Corea, Ryan Bridges. He’s used it all along.”

Harold and Richard faired up the hull before starting REPCO’s first mold and sanded with long boards. It was all done by hand. “They took the boat to Vernon Snyder’s Automotive Garage, turned it over and started making a mold.” said Richard Snyder, Jr.. “Richard laid up fiberglass,” says Fred Snyder. They taped it off, glassed it, put a stern in.” “Harold put in shafts and engines, Vern Charles delivered boats and took orders. REPCO’s 21’ was ‘too big to hold an outboard, too small for an inboard’ so a 4-cylinder Chevy Chevette engine was used — $7,000.00 covered the whole package.

“Re-enforced Plastics Company sold two boats before they even built one,”says Richard Jr. Richard, Sr. had 100 acres on Route 1, where REPCO built a 100 x 60 ft. steel building for $25,000.00. Their loan from Liberty National was re-paid within 2 years. “After that first boat came out of the mold, Richard sprayed gel coat over the hull from a ‘cheap car spray gun’ from Sears. He drilled the tip out. The resin and gel coat came from Advanced Coatings in Massachusetts, the cloth, from Bean Fiberglass, Jaffrey, N.H. A 37’ took just shy of 13 gallons of gel coat. Roughly, 400 of them were built, there was a high shear and low shear design. The 37’s were built from a design by Ernest Briley, a naval architect/ marine engineer affiliated with the Boat School in Eastport. REPCO built 800 30’ft.boats from two molds (one wore out.) Quite a few 21’s were built, and a couple daysailers. REPCO’S decision to build work boats was an easy one.

“Richard and Harold lobstered as did Snyder’s uncle, Bernard, who, after the Navy, fished,” says Kevin Snyder, who hauled with him. “He never wore a glove, he’d put his hand in the barrel, and grab handfuls of bait. He’d take the wheel in one hand and have a pouch of Bugler in the other - twist cigarettes one handed, then run a match, one of those Ohio Blue Tips - right down the front of his shirt.”

From his perch behind Prospect Trading, Don Smith’s gaze is fixed on the harbor. He remembered Bernard, who sold him lobsters from Gouldsboro Point. “That’s where the old man lived,” says Don, referring to Snyder’s Father, Jesse, who worked on coastal schooners before settling in at his saltwater farm.
  
“Jesse would go into the woods, drag oak out for the stem of one of his boats, and saw keels from yellow birch. He’d saw ribs from hackmatack to put through the steam box, then get cedar for planks and knees. He’d whack a maul against the hull to set things in, I’d be on the other side,” recalls Fred Snyder, who lived with his Grandad. “Jesse built boats but it was Harv Church, on Rogers Point road, who showed Harold and Richard how to build. Bud Holland trucked REPCO boats to Arthur Dinsmore’s stone ramp. They’d run sea trials in the Bay.”

“Before fiberglass, everything REPCO built came from the woods in this area,” said Richard Jr.,”While Webber Cove pioneered fiberglass for the Navy, it’s documented by a man who came down from Washington, D.C. that REPCO was the first commercial fiberglass boat manufacturer on the East Coast. REPCO Incorporated in 1968. “It was a matter tossing $500.00 each into the kitty. For $1,500.00, they were Incorporated.” After folding REPCO in the 1980’s, Richard and Harold returned to lobstering.