Cape & Islands News

PT 728 cruises Nantucket Sound

A piece of U.S. history back in Cape Cod waters
Profile in Courage tour honors President Kennedy

  PT 728 rounding the Lewis Bay Lighthouse on its tour of the harbor yesterday.

Story and photos by James Kinsella

Growing up, Wayne Kurker and the other kids in Hyannisport used to head down to the dock when President John F. Kennedy would bring in the family motorboat, the Marlin. He'd invite the children on board, letting them pretend to steer the boat and sit on the vessel's seat cushions in back.

At the time, Kurker said Friday, he didn't think much about it. Wasn't this an ordinary thing, going onto a president's boat?

On Friday morning, Kurker was on another boat in Nantucket Sound, a vessel much like another Kennedy boat that inextricably bound up in the president's life.

That boat was PT 109, the U.S. Navy motor torpedo boat skippered by Kennedy, then an young lieutenant (junior grade.)

While on patrol at night in 1943 in the Solomon Islands, PT 109 was sliced in half by a Japanese destroyer. Although two men in the crew died, Kennedy succeeded in getting the rest of his crew rescued. The story of his heroism played a key role in his eventual successful run for the presidency.

On Friday, Kurker and a group ranging from toddlers to grandfathers climbed aboard PT 728, the sole PT boat still in continuous operation, for a ride through Hyannis Harbor and out into Nantucket Sound.

The morning cruise, which featured graceful, high-speed turns in the Sound, was the first of a series of 90-minute excursions scheduled this weekend to raise funds for the Nantucket Soundkeeper program of the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound.

The Alliance was founded to oppose Cape Wind, a wind turbine farm proposed for Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound. The Soundkeeper's avowed mission is to help protect the ecology of the Sound.

Christy's of Cape Cod is sponsoring the weekend event, named the Profiles in Courage Tour.

Christy Mihos of Yarmouth above on right, the owner of the Christy's convenience store chain, was among those riding along on Friday morning's cruise. In the photo Max Finocchio photographs Christyand Max's grandfather Bruno Finochio.

In a statement, Mihos said the tour "not only is a celebration of naval wartime history, it draws attention to the Sound as a national treasure, an oceanic wilderness of great biological diversity with habitats ranging from the open ocean to the salt marshes."

PT 728's first cruise Friday morning, though, was light on wind farm opposition and ecological consciousness, and heavy on fun.

Katy Brunner (in middle photo on right) helped her daughter, Petie Brunner of HoHoKus, N.J., age 1 1/2, try on a helmet.Christy Mihos and his son, Christy Mihos Jr., both of whom had ridden on PT 728's trip Thursday from Newport, R.I., to Hyannis, struck up conversations with the other passengers.
Crew member Dan Walker took the microphone and gave a talk on the history of the PT boats, known by the Japanese as "devil boats."

Max Finocchio (bottom photo on right) of Brewster, age 6, helped by his father, Mark Finocchio, got into one of the machine-gun turrets.

Pound for pound, Walker said, the PT boats - with their torpedos, deck guns and machine guns - were the most heavily armed vessels in the U.S. Navy. But the speedy wooden vessels also offered little protection for their crews.

Off Hyannisport, skipper Tom White gunned the turbo diesel engines - replacements for the original gasoline engines - and the boat took off, quickly reaching a speed of 22 knots and causing the passengers to hold on.

By the time the boat nosed back into Hyannis Harbor, a general cheerfulness pervaded the boat.
The passengers included Bruno Finocchio, a veteran who served on the U.S. Navy destroyer Gyatt from 1952 to 1954, who called the PT boat ride "wonderful."

"I've never been on one," he said.

Six daily tours are scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 30, and Sunday, Aug. 31, departing from the dock at Baxter's, Pleasant Street, Hyannis, at 9 and 11 a.m. and at 1, 3, 5 and 7 p.m. Tickets are $50 for adults and $20 for children 12 and under. More information is available by calling 508-775-9767 or visiting nantucketsoundkeeper.org.