The Moonrise

Missing the sea Owen moved back to the east coast and to Brookhaven National Laboratory on eastern Long Island. There, he undertook nuclear power plant research for commercial reactors and started the Thermal Hydraulic Development Division, becoming its first Director. It was in 1977 that he met Mary Trovato who became his executive secretary and later one of the two great loves of his life, sailing being the other.

Our Moonrise after extensive refurbishment,
resting at the dock in Lake Champlain.

They  purchased a Rhodes 25, the Moonrise, in 1978. As hull No. 9, she was built in 1951 by Devries Lentch in Amsterdam, Holland, one of the early fiberglass boats constructed. Owen, and later both he and Mary, enjoyed her extensively in waters from Oyster Bay to Nantucket, following some of the paths he had sailed in his childhood.

In 1980 they decided to completely disassemble and rebuild the Moonrise in their basement and garage. She was later trucked upstate then sailed for a number of years on Lake Champlain.