Dana Point : Youngsters Voyage Into the Past Aboard Pilgrim

The square-rigged ship Pilgrim, a familiar sight at her moorings in the west end of Dana Point Harbor, went on two long, historic voyages beginning Tuesday afternoon and continuing this morning--and never once hoisted her anchors.

For most of the time--about 18 hours--she was the brig Beagle, carrying the great naturalist, Charles Robert Darwin, on a 19th-Century scientific cruise. In an earlier voyage, she was the Pilgrim, with a crew including Darwin’s contemporary, author Richard Henry Dana.

In both cases, the crews and the naturalists all were children from the Rolling Hills Elementary School in Fullerton, and the “cruises,” although made as realistic as possible with the gathering of specimens and handling of ropes, were imaginary.

“This was a pilot program for the Beagle-Darwin operations,” said Harry Helling of the Orange County Marine Institute, who is director of all programs involving the institute-owned Pilgrim.

The children went aboard at 3 pm. Tuesday. By 9 this morning, they were to have been taken in outrigger canoes to gather specimens of marine life and to have classified and studied their specimens. They had stood watches throughout the night aboard the Pilgrim.