The association was formed
November 9th 1982 by some people
who had attended the course of
bottle ship building at the
Maritime Museum. Course leader
was Bjorn Thunberg.
After the course the
participants did not want to
split in different directions
but wished to continue to meet
outside the classroom. An
association was formed and had
from the beginning no name.
After having voted on several
proposals, it was agreed on the
name "The bottle skippers".
Bjorn Thunberg was the obvious
first chairman, now honorary
member. The meetings were held
on the first Thursday of every
month on board the lightship
Finngrundet.
The idea of the association was
to meet over a cup of coffee,
talk about bottle ships and
boats in general. Anyone who
wanted could also build bottle
ships at the meeting.
The association has slowly grown
and now has about 40 active
members and Kaj Westergren is
now chairman.
From the beginning you had to
present a self-made bottle ship
to become a member. This has now
been changed and all that is
required is to have a genuine
interest in bottle ships. The
recruitment of new members was
primarily among those who had
attended the bottle ship course
at the Maritime Museum but
others have also been accepted
as members. The association is
now a member of the European
Association of Ships in Bottles.
As the members increased the
premises on the lightship
Finngrundet became too small and
the meetings were moved to
Skeppsholmsgården at
Skeppsholmen in central
Stockholm. Our monthly Thursday
meetings has changed to building
meetings and are now held every
Monday with a small membership
meeting once a month.
One of the purposes of "The
bottle skippers" is to spread
this hobby to more people. We
participate in a number of
different events in the
neighborhood of Stockholm like "Skeppholmens
Day", The hobby fair in
Stockholm etc and we also have
our website. On the website we
reveal the secret of "how will
the boat get into the bottle."
This is a nice way to spread the
hobby to both young persons and
grownups.
