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Webster 1913 Edition


Schooner

Schoon′er

,
Noun.
[See the Note below. Cf.
Shun
.]
(Naut.)
Originally, a small, sharp-built vessel, with two masts and fore-and-aft rig. Sometimes it carried square topsails on one or both masts and was called a
topsail schooner
. About 1840, longer vessels with three masts, fore-and-aft rigged, came into use, and since that time vessels with four masts and even with six masts, so rigged, are built. Schooners with more than two masts are designated three-masted schooners, four-masted schooners, etc. See Illustration in Appendix.
☞ The first schooner ever constructed is said to have been built in Gloucester, Massachusetts, about the year 1713, by a Captain Andrew Robinson, and to have received its name from the following trivial circumstance: When the vessel went off the stocks into the water, a bystander cried out,“O, how she scoons!” Robinson replied, “ A scooner let her be;” and, from that time, vessels thus masted and rigged have gone by this name. The word scoon is popularly used in some parts of New England to denote the act of making stones skip along the surface of water. The Scottish scon means the same thing. Both words are probably allied to the Icel. skunda, skynda, to make haste, hurry, AS. scunian to avoid, shun, Prov. E. scun. In the New England records, the word appears to have been originally written scooner. Babson, in his “History of Gloucester,” gives the following extract from a letter written in that place Sept. 25, 1721, by Dr. Moses Prince, brother of the Rev. Thomas Prince, the annalist of New England: “This gentleman (Captain Robinson) was first contriver of schooners, and built the first of that sort about eight years since.”

Schoon′er

,
Noun.
[D.]
A large goblet or drinking glass, – used for lager beer or ale.
[U.S.]

Webster 1828 Edition


Schooner

SCHOON'ER

,
Noun.
A vessel with two masts, whose main-sail and fore- sail are suspended by gaffs, like a sloop's main-sail, and stretched below by booms.

Definition 2024


schooner

schooner

English

Noun

schooner (plural schooners)

  1. (nautical) A sailing ship with two or more masts, all with fore-and-aft sails; if two masted, having a foremast and a mainmast.
    • 1907, Harold Bindloss, chapter 6, in The Dust of Conflict:
      The night was considerably clearer than anybody on board her desired when the schooner Ventura headed for the land.
    • 2004, Reese Palley, The Best of Nautical Quarterly: Volume 1: The Lure of Sail, page 181,
      Designed by Frank Payne's renowned Boston design office, and built in 1928 of longleaf yellow pine, this 82-footer has been a racing schooner — a staysail schooner — since the heyday of Class-A ocean racing in schooners during the late 1920s and early 1930s.
    • 2005, Otmar Schäuffelen, Chapman: Great Sailing Ships of the World, page xxi,
      In addition to the square-rigged sailing ships, the schooners were the second largest group of large sailing vessels.
    • 2007, Donald Launer, Lessons from My Good Old Boat, page 240,
      Unfortunately, anyone looking for a schooner today has limited choices. In the used boat market there are always some wooden hulls available, and occasionally ones of steel or aluminum, but fiberglass-hulled schooners are harder to come by.
  2. (Australia) A glass of beer, of a size which varies between states (Wikipedia).
    • a. 1964, Arthur Upfield, Fozen Pumps, 2008, Kees de Hoog (editor), Up and Down Australia: Short Stories Selected by Kees de Hoog, page 67,
      Foaming schooners of beer grew ever larger and more numerous as the crimson February suns went to their rest.
    • 2004, Ken Ewell, Voyages of Discovery: A Manly Adventure in the Lands Down Under, page 94,
      And needless to say, the Western Australia row will eventually be filled in as well, though not before drinking a schooner of the amber nectar in Perth.
    • 2009, Charles Rawlings-Way, Meg Worby, Lindsay Brown, Paul Harding, Central Australia: Adelaide to Darwin, Lonely Planet, page 59,
      For a true Adelaide experience, head for the bar and order a schooner of Coopers, the local brew, or a glass of SA′s impressive wine.
  3. (US) A large goblet or drinking glass, used for lager or ale (Wikipedia).

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