"I hire women," said Marian Beck, the Halibut Cove artist and businesswoman who has owned the vessel since 1975.

"I got paid less when I started out just because I was a woman operator. It was really, really hard to start being a skipper as a girl and since then, I just always trained women. Over all the years, it's just become our identity."

Beck, who also operates the Saltry Restaurant in Halibut Cove the Danny J's primary destination said the boat has been a labor of love for her and many others in Homer and Halibut Cove during the last few decades.

In addition to numerous skippers and deckhands, local boat builders and woodworkers like Dave Seaman and Doug Schweisow have helped with several restoration projects, including a refurbished deck made of fir and new wooden railings.

"Those of us who have wooden boats are eccentrics, but the boats just have a lot of heart. The whole boat has been rebuilt with fir. I was told that fir has a lot of honor," said Beck.

Originally built for the Army in 1941 by famed boat designer Edward Monk, the Danny J, which then had an open hull, was used as a ship-to-shore troop transport in Seattle.

By the early 1960s, the boat had found its way to Kodiak, where it picked up its current name probably a reference to a family member, said Beck and was eventually sold to the Tillion family in Halibut Cove.

In 1966, the Danny J was put to work in Homer as a Kachemak Bay ferry, where it still makes three round trips per day between Homer, Gull Island and Halibut Cove every summer between Memorial Day and Labor Day.

"It's the most wonderful feeling boat," said Tammy Barnett, who has skippered the Danny J since 1986.

Photo by Aaron selbig Tammy Barnett, who has captained the Danny J for 23 years, shows off the vessel's wheelhouse.

Tourists love the Danny J, too, said Beck and Barnett.

On a beautiful, sunny morning last Thursday, as Barnett and deckhand Liz Ervice worked to clean the vessel after the morning run from Halibut Cove, Harry and Sue Parsonage walked up to the Danny J's slip to ask about availability on the afternoon trip.

The Parsonages, from the San Francisco Bay area, first visited Homer in 1994, and were so impressed, Sue Parsonage tried to land a nursing job at South Peninsula Hospital so they could move here.

Although that impromptu plan didn't work out, they always remembered their trip to Halibut Cove aboard the Danny J, said Harry Parsonage.

"It's a great little boat. Homer's gotten a lot bigger in 15 years, but it doesn't look like the Danny J has changed too much," he said.

Aaron Selbig can be reached at aaron. selbig@homernews.com.

boat name:

Danny J

owner:

Marian Beck

hull material:

Wood

engine/fuel type:

Six-cylinder Perkins diesel

builder:

Edward Monk

built: 1941

length: 42'

weight: 13 tons