The tall ship Gazela is not the first thing you notice about Penn’s Landing these days. Lately, the Delaware Riverfront is a major construction site, with giant vehicles working to cap I-95 to create a walk-over park from Old City to the water. But if you get to the water, find yourself between the Seaport Museum and Spruce Street Harbor Park, and look towards the docks, you’ll see her there, a living, sailing piece of history in a city where ports and maritime trade were once foundational.
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Built in Portugal in 1901 as a commercial fishing vessel, the wooden barkentine Gazela stretches almost 200 feet — almost twice as large as her sibling tugboat, Jupiter, which is owned and cared for by the same owner, the nonprofit Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild (PSPG). Though her masts are currently down for off-season repair, and she floats covered in a winterwear white tarp, slivers of a rich green across her hull hint at Gazela’s character. It’s this character — and the age-old lure of the life on the high seas — that’s drawn volunteer after volunteer to step aboard, roll up their sleeves, get down to work, and, if they’re dedicated, to go for a sail.
Locals have been volunteering on the ship for years, showing up to open call hours every Saturday from 10am to 5pm. All 250 PSPG volunteers do all manner of tasks, from restoring original carpentry to tidying up the ship’s interior. To the volunteers, and to the members who pay for extra perks associated with the ship, it’s worth it — not just for the incredibly rare setting, or for the multi-day voyage a handful of them will take mid-June from Philly to the Chesapeake Bay, to celebrate the ship’s 125 years afloat — but for the community.
Kara Fraser, who comes in from the Haddonfield/Westmont area, has been volunteering on the Gazela since 2022. “I love this damn boat, and I love the people on it,” she says.
An original
Unlike most tall ships that serve as floating museums, the Gazela is no replica. The all-wood vessel sailed for nearly 70 years from Lisbon to Newfoundland and back again, until newer ships made her commercially obsolete. She is the oldest actively sailing vessel of her kind, stalwartly “pickled,” jokes PSPG Executive Director and Gazela expert Gina Pickton, by the salt used to pack her fishy freight — up to 350 tons of cod — back in the day. (The ship’s neighbor the Moshulu is also an original, and the country’s largest remaining original windjammer. Although she’s no longer seaworthy, she does serve fruity vodka cocktails — in clear purses — on her deck.)
Retired in 1969, Gazela sold in 1971 to William Wikoff Smith, a Wharton graduate, oil magnate, maritime enthusiast and major Seaport Museum benefactor. She’s called Philadelphia home since then and became part of the Guild in 1985, six years after Wikoff Smith’s death.
On a recent 10-degree morning, Pickton teaches an introductory class to a small group of adults interested in learning more about Gazela on the ship. The students are wrapped in jackets and range from a longtime Guild member sitting in just because to a newcomer looking to get involved in the tugboat trade. Pickton welcomes each of them warmly and likens Gazela’s history to a uniquely local immigration story. The ship grew up abroad, came to America, and is now through-and-through Philadelphian, and, like so many Philadelphians, will play an integral role in this summer’s semiquincentennial celebration.
The Gazela won’t be entirely alone in the voyage. A number of other tall and military ships will join her. Along the way, she will stop in Alexandria and Norfolk, Virginia (with other ports TBA), where people will come aboard to learn more about the role of ships in American history. (She’ll then stay in Norfolk about a month to drydock for inspection and maintenance.)
“With this vessel in particular, we have the opportunity to share it with so many people, and we have the opportunity to make a difference in so many people’s lives … by going slower and doing it intentionally, we can make a really big difference,” Pickton says.
Crewing the ship will be between 15 and 30 PSPG members, consisting of a paid captain and first mate, along with experienced members who will sign up on a first-come, first-serve basis. (For daytime sails, the ship can have up to 35 crew members.) To qualify, a participant must have logged at least 40 hours aboard since the previous November, worked at least one event in the past year, and have attended classes in safe shipmating, emergency response, standing watch and line handling. Easing the journey for modern sailors: Since 1938, she’s operated with retrofitted motors.
For the people who work and sail on her, the Gazela is a labor of love and a way to create community.
The PSPG
Membership to the PSPG — a requirement for sailing on the Gazela — starts at $65 per individual, and includes perks such as discounted or free access to skills classes, invitations to the Guild’s annual dinner, and 10 percent off of merchandise.
Elliot Engles began volunteering for PSPG in September of 2025 and recently became a member, thanks to the organization’s sponsored membership program. Like many volunteers, Engles, age 29, is interested in a career in maritime work. Since earning his MFA in painting, Engles had been doing gig work and jobs for galleries and other artists. More recently, PSPG has hired him full-time to help prep Gazela for the June sailout. Pickton says other members have gone into the Coast Guard, captained ships, and worked on everything from tall ships to research vessels. She also casually tosses out countless names of far-flung places her sails have brought her to.
Anyone wanting to join the June or any larger sail must take basic crew-training classes such as Line Handling and Vessel Familiarization, which are open to anyone 16 and up (or 14 with a parent’s permission). For folks interested in a maritime career, PSPG has offered a paid, 16-week pre-apprenticeship program since 2024. The organization calls apprenticing there “hands-on experience, job-readiness instruction, and industry site visits.”
Yvonne Flowers-Huffman, a volunteer of two years, was part of the first such program. “We got paid to sleep on the boat if we wanted to, and usually five days a week, we would help with winterization, with wood maintenance, installment … once or twice a month we would take field trips to different maritime trades … we attended the Tall Ships America conference where every tall ship in the Tall Ships America fleet got together,” she says. “We talked about safety, networking, communications, the future… I had a lot of fun.”
For younger future sailors, PSPG also hosts school field trips, educating kids about science, history, and trade while touring Gazela.
She’s a vessel of many purposes. At least once, Gazela has helped put the “ship” in “relationship”. Melissa Simmons, head of PSPG’s governing board, got closer to the man who’d become her husband while volunteering on Gazela. “I didn’t just fall in love with the boy,” she says. “I fell in love with the ship.”
Keeping the Gazela afloat
The ship isn’t formally connected to the neighboring Seaport Museum. But the director of the museum’s Boat Shop certainly is aware of the gem docked nearby. David Dormond explains that approaching the sorts of replicas whose builds he oversees and keeping a 125-year-old ship in working condition are very different tasks. “Gazela is a historic ship that’s sitting in need of a lot of love, and keeping it going and keeping it afloat is equally important.”
He and his team are currently building a replica of the boat that George Washington used to cross the Delaware, with hopes of installing her at Washington Crossing in June.
PSPG volunteers come and go, making the maintenance and expansion feel, says Pickton, “like a 50-year-old startup.” The restoration of Gazela alone has a hefty price tag of about $15 million. While the current yearly budget has grown from around $130,000 to $350,000, Pickton estimates that PSPG will ultimately need $600,000 annually, not just to sustain the vessel, but also to grow the organization.
Going forward, the board would like to continue the pre-apprenticeship program, expand elements of PSPG’s maritime education arm, conduct an oral history project about Gazela, grow membership and expand reach. Ultimately, the organization would like to finance its own, more permanent space on the water, but for now, all hands seem to be on deck to prepare for the summer sail to celebrate the semiquincentennial.
“This is America’s 250th year,” Pickton says, “and this is Gazela’s 125th year. We’re kind of focusing on this as a history year for us … talking about Gazela’s history and how it relates to our present. Talking about the stories of our past, and how we’re using that to help other people in the future.”
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