10 • October 2020
BOAT OF THE MONTH
Coast River Business Journal
Motor Lifeboat 36391, Point Adams
By Emily Lindblom
Coast River Business Journal • elindblom@crbizjournal.com
Photos Courtesy of Glen Cathers
Vessel:
Motor Lifeboat 36391, Point Adams
Homeport:
Warrenton
Owner:
Glen Cathers
Year built:
1934
Builder location:
Curtis Bay, Maryland at the U.S. Coast
Guard Yard
Model:
Type T-Revised
Engine:
110 HP Sterling Petrel gas engine
Length:
36 feet
Weight:
20,000 pounds
Stability:
Self-righting and self-bailing
The Motor Lifeboat 36391, Point Adams was originally
a Coast Guard boat. It was brought into service on May 25,
1934 then transported to Coast Guard Station Point Adams in
Hammond. It received a Gold Lifesaving Medal after rescuing
four men from a broken fishing boat in Clatsop Spit. In 1955,
the Motor Lifeboat 36391 was sold out of service.
During the following decades, the boat was altered and not
maintained. By the time the current owner, Glen Cathers, came
across it in the Port of Astoria in 2005, it was in poor condition
but the bottom remained solid.
“I bought her, brought her home and spent the next seven
years rebuilding her to original Coast Guard specs,” Cathers
said. “391 has bronze parts from 15 different motor lifeboats
that were broken up over the years, parts that were saved as
mementos by the crews who drove them.”
During the restoration process, Cathers uncovered the
boat numbers 36391, researched them and learned from a Coast
Guard historian that it had been stationed at Point Adams for its
entire service.
“Until that moment I was unaware that the boat was in
fact one I had been out on many times as a child in the late ‘40s
and early ‘50s and that my father as a coastguardsman at Point
Adams from 1936 to 1955 had driven our boat many, many
times on rescue missions,” Cathers said. “This boat is very
special to me, not only for its historical significance but for its
deeply personal place in my heart.”
Cathers relaunched the Point Adams in 2012 and has since
toured the Coast Guard stations along the west coast, showing
the boat to crews. For three months in 2018, Cathers took it on
a tour of the Great Lakes and the 49 small boat stations there.
Now, the Point Adams 36391 is the only T-Revised model,
36-foot motor lifeboat in service condition of 69 that were built.
Glen Cathers restored the Motor Lifeboat 36391, Point Adams.
Glen Cathers’ father, John Cathers, in uniform on the cabin top
and his uncle, Norman Moore, the civilian on the port side forward,
in 1938.
Glen Cathers and Naomi Fisher in the Point Adams on the
Columbia River.
The Point Adams enters Newport on a tour.
Glen Cathers shows the boat to the crew of the Coast Guard
Station Michigan City during his 2018 cruise of the Great Lakes.
