Donald McKay

Donald McKay, designer and builder of clipper ships (b at Jordan Falls, NS 4 Sept 1810; d at Hamilton, Mass 20 Sept 1880). As a boy he learned the shipbuilder's trade in his father's and uncle's shipyards on the Jordan River. He immigrated to New York in 1827 and at age 16 bound himself an apprentice to Isaac Webb. After his indenture was up he became a free-lance shipwright, worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, then in Wiscasset, Maine, and in 1841 formed a partnership in Newburyport, Mass, where he made a reputation building fast packet ships. In 1845 McKay opened his own shipyard in east Boston, where he began building the great clipper ships - Flying Cloud, Great Republic, Sovereign of the Seas - that set long-standing records for fast passages and carried his name throughout the world.