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Beyond The Beach Lies Infinity

from The Endless Grid by Gand

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lyrics

King Philip was built in Alna, Maine in 1856. Seven years later she was being advertised as "a strictly first-class clipper ship with quick dispatch" and "well-known to shippers as one of the best and most reliable vessels in the California trade. Stands A-1 for seven years". With a wooden hull and three masts, she was a medium-sized clipper displacing 1,100 tons. She was named for Metacomet (who was known to the English as "King Philip"), a war chief or sachem of the Wampanoag Indians. Metacomet was the Wampanoag's leader in King Philip's War.

The ship carried cargo from the Eastern United States to San Francisco, and called at Baker Island for guano. The route required going around Cape Horn, which is famous for its enormous storms. The historian Samuel Eliot Morison has called this kind of ship "the noblest of all sailing vessels." The fastest-ever clipper ship, Flying Cloud, once sailed from New York City to San Francisco in only 89 days; the King Philip, although fast, was not as fast.

King Philip had a turbulent history, including at least two mutinies or sailors' rebellions, with the ship surviving being set on fire on both of those occasions. Finally, on January 25, 1878, 22 years after she was built, the King Philip left San Francisco Bay under Captain A.W. Keller, bound for Port Gamble, carrying no cargo. A steam-powered tugboat had towed her out of the Bay, in order to help her maneuver in the dangerous waters. At that exact moment, an accident caused the death of the captain of a ship that was nearby, and the tugboat crew was called upon to help out with that emergency. Left on her own without the tugboat to steer her, the King Philip dropped an anchor, but the anchor did not hold fast, and the clipper drifted with the current towards the breakers of the beach and ran aground in heavy surf, which caused the ship to break apart.

In its news article, the Daily Alta California described the scene:

“Left helpless, anchors gone, sails clewed up, no friendly breeze, no hope, the gallant craft strikes and strikes the sand as if in anger, but powerless, as the hard, cold beach starts her timbers, tears her rudder out, crushes her keel and mashes her stout timbers in matchwood…”

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from The Endless Grid, released July 12, 2014

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Gand San Francisco, California

Ambient, ambient techno, dub techno, new age, place-oriented music. See also bromf-sf.bandcamp.com.

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