The Ash Breeze, Spring 2025

By Richard (Dick) Steeg and Jayne Bourke Steeg

First, you have to build a little boat. The transformative power of a small project with a significant personal impact on youth recovering from substance abuse—supporting self-
esteem, personal growth, accomplishment, and responsibility for a hopeful future. Our story begins.

For years, my wife and I have been Chesapeake Bay people, always near and around, especially sailing our sturdy little sloop for several years and settling in the town of Oxford on the Tred Avon River on Maryland’s Eastern Shore among the watermen and osprey.

Life gets in the way, and there are invariable unexpected changes, moves, and retirement. Then what?

I grew up on the Bay’s Western shore. My grandparents had a shore property, and my fondest memories at five years old were messing around in the two skiffs my grandfather and his brother built. I can still see their gray-blue color. And, watching them commission the old pull-type gasoline outboards in 55-gallon drums in the dank summer house cellar. The smoke and smell still resonate. These small sturdy boats were built for crabbing on the creek, and crabbing we did.

My wife grew up on Long Island Sound, taking her first solo sail in a little sloop at five years old and ultimately sailing the islands. Her parents sailed well into their late seventies on the Bay. As they say, messing about in boats.
So, the Bay, indelible experiences, sailing, rowing, drifting, swinging on an anchor on a warm summer night, reefing for weather, and running before the wind are a collective part of us. It’s in the soul.

Fast forward. With retirement approaching, we moved to south-central Pennsylvania for various reasons. The Bay is now replaced by beautiful undulating farms and fields as far as the eye can see. But the Bay and our history continue to pull us back.

We had always been involved in giving back in our careers, especially early on through Rotary and various nonprofits, volunteering at NIH with sick children in need, and others. Now we have time to commit to a new life chapter.

Recalling memories of my grandfather’s skiffs, I set out to build my own little boats in retirement, a 13’ skiff and a 17’ dory, both completed and finely finished. He would approve. Both stitch and glue traditional small boats. As an engineer, I appreciated the challenges and problem-solving that come with the building task. Nothing is as simple as presented. The principles of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math— or STEM—did not escape me.

The small boat building experience had set us to discuss the many advantages that building small boats might have for youth, initially from a STEM perspective. In researching this, we identified numerous boat-building programs for youthand a lot of advice. Teaching With Small Boats Alliance is a significant resource. We were on to something in an area that could support a program. But what we were on to was about to take a twist.

We considered and started establishing a nonprofit program in the Lancaster, Pennsylvania, area to build little boats, focused on underserved and disadvantaged youth in the area from a STEM perspective. A colleague suggested an alternative that brought all of the benefits of these programs to bear but as a volunteer partner to an existing nonprofit organization that he felt was in need.

That has started a partnership journey in establishing a little boat-building program for an organization known as Manos House in Columbia, Pennsylvania. Manos House is a residential facility for substance abuse-recovering male youths fourteen to twenty years old. This facility is their last step in recovering their life forward. Everything is on the line. A misstep could potentially mean repeated detention or incarceration.

We introduced the concept of a small boat-building program to the organization’s Executive Director, Chris Runkle in October 2024. Chris and his counselor staff saw the immediate opportunity to support recovering youth through this program well beyond building a little boat. We had anticipated focusing on STEM, but we soon understood that youth involvement in the program would foster attributes of self-worth, self-esteem, personal growth, responsibility, accountability, teamwork, communication, and accomplishment—notwithstanding all of the learnings associated with building a boat—all of the elements for supporting a successful and enduring recovery.

No one there was familiar with or had built a small boat before. The organization committed to the program essentially “sight unseen” and screened three youths who were deemed to have the maturity and aptitude to participate in the project. A conditioned workspace was provided, the kit procured, and tools and supplies assembled. The flat box containing an 8’ lapstrake Chesapeake Light Craft Eastport Pram arrived, and the box cracked open on November 2, 2024. The journey began.

Three youths with different backgrounds from different areas, sharing similar issues, were introduced to the “flat box.” There was interest and some skepticism regarding the transformation from a box of wood pieces to a fully functional and complete small boat. The irony did not escape us that these youths themselves came through the doors of the organization essentially as a “flat box” and would hopefully be leaving as a completely sturdy and “functional boat.”

Over the course of the next ten weeks from November 2, 2024, through January 11, 2025, every Saturday and some Sundays through the holidays, work proceeded. The youths would be completing their recovery program in mid-January 2025.

The camaraderie ensued, the learnings were absorbed, challenges were identified, problems were solved, self-worth and self-esteem began to emerge, and interest peaked all the way through. We had the youth sign the bottom of the boat with a Sharpie that was epoxied and glassed over giving them permanent ownership to their efforts. This was the highlight of the boatbuilding regardless of anything else and a huge deal for them. They worked hard, learned hard, and produced. And they understood, maybe for the first time, that the effort was not just about building a little boat. This was all too apparent when we provided each of the youths with a Certificate of Accomplishment for their efforts, well-earned and deserved. All of them are eager to continue messing around with little boats, and hopefully that will happen.

We will begin with our next group in mid-March 2025, building the same little boat kit, fostering the same attributes, and seeking the same outcome and results. The Manos House organization is seeking to extend and perhaps enhance this program in the future. We are indebted to them for the opportunity to make a positive difference in a young man’s life and to support the organization’s efforts as volunteers.

Some have questioned why we are doing this in the particular environment of substance abuse-recovering youth. There should be no stigma assigned here. Addiction is a disease that can be treated. These youth are not “throwaways,” and, yes, it is up to them to take ownership of their future. Not all will; we know that. These youth are looking to believe in themselves as much as for us to believe in them. The small boat building at Manos House gives them a chance. If a tangible difference can be made to even one youth through this program it will be well worth the effort.

Manos House has been awarded a $2,000 John Gardner Grant providing partial funding for the spring boatbuilding project.

Dick Steeg is Project Director at Manos House Little Boats Program, Columbia, Pennsylvania.  www.manoshouse.com