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TUKTOYAKTUK - First-time visitors to Tuktoyaktuk are often surprised to find the good ship Our Lady of Lourdes sitting in permanent dry dock near the edge of town.

Sister Fay Trombley is spearheading a minor restoration of the former Catholic Mission ship Our Lady of Lourdes. With the help of Tuk youth and other volunteers, the exterior of the ship will be scraped down and repainted. - Brodie Thomas/NNSL photos

The schooner once sailed the Beaufort Sea in service to the people of the Arctic. Its work is now done and it rests silently near the Catholic mission.

Sister Fay Trombley is the ship's current steward. Her picture window looks out on the Lady, and after several years of watching the paint peel away, Trombley decided the old girl needed a fresh coat of paint. With the help of local volunteers and visitors, Trombley scraped down most of the exterior of the ship this summer and is adding a fresh coat of paint.

Much of the scraping has been done by youth in the area.

"I might be out working and they would just drop by and help, or sometimes I would phone them," she said.

The ship was donated to the Arctic missions in the 1930s by Pope Pius XI. It sailed between Cambridge Bay and Aklavik, stopping at all the communities along the way. The ship helped deliver supplies and people to the communities along the coast.

Like some saintly body that will not decompose, the Lady seems to be immune to dry rot. While its paint was peeling before the current restoration and the masts have seen better days, the body of the ship itself is solid and airtight. It would probably float like a cork were it placed in the water today.

Trombley said it has stood up to the weather for all these years because it is made of teak, a very dense tropical wood that withstands rot and mould. Built in California, the teak body would have withstood the Arctic ice almost as well as any steel ship.

There are still many people alive today who have sailed on the ship. One of the ship's tasks was to ferry children to residential schools in the south. The captain would often offer free rides to families who were trying to get from one community to another. The ship has room for 11 people to sleep. Two of the bunks are in the wheelhouse, presumably for the captain and another crew member.

The Lady had several captains over the years, but perhaps the most famous and celebrated was Father Robert LeMeur. His picture now hangs in the Arctic mission.

"His eyes follow you as you walk across the room," said Trombley. The captain received the Order of Canada for his service to Arctic communities and an icebreaker was named after him.

LeMeur asked to be buried beside the vessel, and his fenced-in grave can now be seen just a few feet from the hull of the ship.

Another celebrated captain was Billy Thrasher, who piloted the ship for about 20 years. He stopped sometime in the late 1950s.

"They let him retire and they gave him a 40-foot scow for his services," said Billy's son Lawrence Thrasher. The scow was a gift from the Catholic Church.

Before Billy died in 1968, he continued to travel on Arctic waters until the very end.

Lawrence only remembers being on the Lady a few times.

"My mom didn't want me to go any more. He was going out and we never knew when he was coming back. There was the danger of being iced in," said Thrasher.

He said his father was a skilled navigator who showed many people how to navigate the route to Cambridge Bay.

Thrasher now has his own boat, an open Lund with a 60hp kicker. He said the knowledge his father gave him about the sea has made him more confident in his own boat.

"I know when not to go and when to go. You have to be wise about it," said Thrasher.

And while the Lady of Lourdes will probably never see the water again, it will hopefully remain on land for years to come as a reminder to future generations.

According to Trombley, the ship still has occasional occupants.

"The crow's nest has ravens nesting in it every year," said Trombley.