b'C H A P T E R T H R E EThat individual was Tom Ennis, former M. I. T. student and World War II veteran.He had gone into boat building with the accomplished craftsman Spaulding Dunbar at what is now Pease Boat Works & Marine Railway, at the end of Eliphamets Lane.Talks between Ennis and Kenney went smoothly, and Ennis bought the property at the corner of Champlain and Stage Harbor Roads on a hand shake for $100,000, as Enniss daughter, Nancy Geiger, explains. Ennis brought with him from the Mill Pond his corporate name of Old Mill Boat Yard; thats stuck ever since. His move to the 3.3-acre site came about in 1971.1On arriving, the Ennises stepped into a virtual Smithsonian collection of marine itemsevery screw, every nail, every piece of string that had ever been there, says Mrs. Geiger.My first job was to start going through those drawers. I think they made 95 dump runs thatTom Ennis, the well-remembered first summer.Ennis focused on boat repair,owner and operator of OMBY manufacture, and storage. With as many asfrom 1971 to 1981, when it came eighteen on his payroll in his best years, he hadperilously close to turning into a a good 350 customers and defied the oddscommercial dockominium.against a boat yards turning a profit. But whenCourtesy of Nancy Ennis Geigerhis wife fell seriously ill in the fall of 1981, the reality struck home: hed have to sell.A man from Virginia who summered in Orleans, one Sherwood Woody Pierce, stepped forward to see if Ennis and he could make a deal.In its lifetime, OMBY has stood up to many a storm. This was how the yard looked after a devastating hurricane blew through in the World War II years. Courtesy of Nancy Ennis Geiger36'