Sketching his future: Longtime boat builder Peter Patterson reflects on his career
- communications193
- Apr 7
- 7 min read
A math teacher patrols his classroom, checking work as students silently add and subtract. One student is puzzling over his page. Peering over the student's shoulder, the teacher doesn't see an equation. On the paper is a drawing, a scene. A paint shed here, a marine rail there. The student isn't stuck on numbers. He is trying to figure out where in the boatyard to place the shop. The teacher grabs young Peter Patterson by the ear.
After a quick conference with the school's principal, Peter found himself at a nearby vocational school in Lunenburg learning boat building. He had gotten lucky.
"I was very fortunate," remembers Peter, who hails from Musquodoboit Harbour, "when I graduated from the two-year program at community college I had my high school as well. I didn't have that guarantee going in, and it would have been a tragic mistake."
Peter was offered a job at Snyder's Shipyard in Dayspring about four months before his school term was up.
"This was privilege," he remembers, "a chance to go out and work, maybe make back a little bit of money, get some real life experience, fill a vacancy in the industry, and then come back and write your test."
Peter started working at Snyder's and it was different from school. "We never used to hire kids," Teddy Snyder told him. Another turn of good luck.
Work at Snyder's was big, hard, heavy and tough. Building with a variety of local wood, many of them green, big three-inch planks, helped Peter learned how much elbow grease goes into boat building. Working with green wood means starting with fresh, rough-cut wood that has a high moisture content. It's easier to shape than dry wood, but heavier.
Builders were often exposed to the elements too. Peter remembers hopping around under the counter (the rear part of the boat that hangs over the water) of a 65-footer from dry spot to dry spot over exposed wet earth at low tide.
The first person to the shop in the morning had a prized job, allowed in the wood-steaming room where it was nice and warm. The next best thing was to work on the planking crew. Sometimes Peter got to do that, and he enjoyed handling planks still warm from the steam room. A bit of relief in the airy cold of winter boat work.
In addition to building boats, Peter learned repair. Huge boats, over 100 feet, sat by the outside docks on the water with staging on rafts alongside. Pieces would be removed—winches, deck planks and beams and more—and the boat would rise up, exposing parts of the hull usually submerged. "Next thing we'd have boats at the dock, and we'd have planks off four feet below the waterline of the bow," remembers Peter, "because the bow would be sticking up out the water."
Builders with experience would take new people under their wing. "You'd see tricks and learn stuff," says Peter. "Two years in school had prepared you to not waste his time. I think that's partly why the apprenticeship program is a successful and right approach to what we're doing here in Nova Scotia."
In the offseason Peter taught sailing in Shediac, New Brunswick. After the end of the season he came home through Halifax. On the Halifax-Dartmouth ferry, he felt a tap on his shoulder. It was Dorothy Murphy, a long-time friend. Dorothy was married to Gerard Murphy of Murphy's On The Water. "Why don't you go see Gerard?" she said. Peter was always up for a chat.
Finding Gerard, he said, "I heard you're looking for a shipwright."
"No no, I'm not looking for a shipwright," Gerard said, "I'm looking for a navigator." The Murphy-owned tall ship Mar II was due to go down South.
Soon Peter found himself in Tortola under a Caribbean sun. It had been a fun sail, but now what?Docked at a marina, having breakfast on the back deck with Gerard and other crew, he stressed about getting back to Nova Scotia, back to his job. "Why would you do that?" said Gerard, "you're here now." There was lots of work to be had among the boats in Tortola. Peter wasn't convinced. He needed work. As far as he was concerned, the only job available was back home. Gerard decided to prove a point as a man walked past on the dock. "Hey," he called out, "you looking for crew?" The man stopped.
"You? What do you do?" he asked Gerard.
"Not me," Gerard said, pointing at Peter, "this fella. He's a shipwright from Nova Scotia." The man looked at Peter.
"Have you had breakfast?"
Peter looked down at the spread on the table between himself and Gerard, a half-eaten plate in front of each of them.
"No," said Peter.
"Come on," said the man, "I'll buy you breakfast."
The man was skipper on a 65-foot boat that had hit a reef and been scuttled on a beach off Saint John [island] (while somebody else was steering). It was great luck to meet a shipwright from Nova Scotia, with his own tools, looking for work that morning.
Peter called to let Snyder's Shipyard know he wouldn't be returning.
For the next ten months he worked on the 65-footer's wooden interior. That skipper may have felt lucky to find Peter, but Peter was lucky too. He was discovering independence. From then on, Peter Patterson worked for himself. "When I came back from there I guess I was cocky enough to sorta be on my own from that point on," he remembers.
While he has worked for many owners, skippers and boatyards through the years, for the most part he has been "freelance, or under my own shingle."
Peter eventually found himself splitting time between the Caribbean driving a 75-foot motor yacht and Cape Breton driving an 85-foot motorsailer. He kept working, kept making connections. In Baddeck, one of those connections, an American summer resident, offered seed money to start a business. He had a handmade wooden boat and he wanted it to be taken care of. Peter decided to settle down. Now was his chance to form a full business.
Peter went for it and jobs came quickly. Before the building was finished boats began to arrive for work. "we had two boats in the bay before the building was built," says Peter, "and we've never caught up." It's not your traditional boatyard. It's nowhere near the water, which surprises some people. Since most boat owners want their boats fixed during the winter so they can use them in the summer, Peter says it's not a priority to be near the water.
His travel and networking have kept work coming steadily, and to this day Peter says he's never had to advertise, and his shop doesn't even have a sign by the road. The company does, however, have a website, featuring photos of boats on Baddeck's beautiful Bras d'Or lake. 2025 is the eleventh season of work for Bras d'Or Boatworks.
Through Peter's career in boat building he has seen and been a part of drastic modernization. He was certified early as a Marine Service Technician through the NS Apprenticeship Agency. Bras d'Or Boatworks was one of the first companies to buy a hydraulic trailer to lift boats, and technologies like 3D printing, CAD, CAM and environmentally friendly materials all mean that a fishing boat today is nothing like one from decades past. Now Peter is attending workshops about vacuum resin infusion, a cleaner and more efficient way to fabricate with fibreglass. "The idea of infusing and pulling resin through, that was voodoo stuff that was done at aircraft labs and stuff," says Peter, "now you look at it and think, 'God, why haven't we been doing that?'...Technology is the key for us and for everyone," he continues, "I think that's the key to employee retention in some of the manufacturing."
Running a business has been an interesting challenge. Peter thought that he could manage the shop and do the work he loves, but found himself doing lots of paperwork and meetings. "If you go into this because you love boat building, you have to have a plan," he says," in retrospect I would have hired a business manager instead of someone to work in my yard."
Asked about advice he'd offer to anyone considering starting a business, he says "look for somebody that appreciates your talents!" And to meet as many people as possible. "The common component the whole way through has been the people. It's such an equalizing thing."
Peter has found himself in places he'd never get to without his boat building and maintenance skills. He got to meet and talk to very interesting people. "When you're in the industry," he explains, "you get there on your merits...they weren't all necessarily the rich people, they were people that had sailed somewhere or accomplished something, or built their own boat, or did a passage. Again, you have to have a way to get in there."
And it helps to like talking to people. "I've had some people call on me that aren't buying anything, they've never bought anything from me and they're not going to. But they have to call first...that doesn't make you money but it's part of who I am and who the people that do this are. I'm not singular in that."
It is nice to set your own schedule. Peter sometimes works alone at Bras d'Or Boatworks. "The open concept has worked great for me, and it's kind of inspiring sometimes," he says, "you stand here and it's a pretty sight." It even looks like the sketch he drew back in school. "It's condensed, and much of it is still unbuilt, but when I look around the yard I see where it goes."
And the next time the door opens and somebody walks in, a good conversation follows.
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