Robert Douglas, who founded the Black Dog in Martha's vineyard and transformed the Labrador Retriever Mix tavern logo into an international summer coat of arms, passed away Wednesday at a family home on the island. He was 93 years old.
His son, Jamie Douglas, said the cause was prostate cancer.
Robert Douglas hopes to say goodbye to summer visitors from the coastline when he returns the ferry to the mainland after spending his summer in Massachusetts in 1960, spending summers with his family and falling in love with maritime culture.
Douglas designed a top-selling schooner on the island for his first few years. It is still named Shenandoah, a waterfront fixture in the vineyard haven. However, he later turned his attention to the construction of the restaurant. This is a smart and reliable port. This is where people can come all year round to get real New England chowder.
His Labrador Boxer mix, Black Dog, is named after the pirates from Robert Lewis Stephenson's novel “Treasure Island.”
According to Vineyard Gazette, Black Dog Tavern opened on the Great Ve in 1971, and the Black Dog's imposing profile, illustrated by Stephanie Phalen, will be incorporated into the business in 1976.
By the early 1980s, portraits of black dogs were added to the apparel, including colorful t-shirts, thick sweatshirts, stone hats, mugs and cookie tins, with the year of purchase on the front and back. The items quickly became collectibles for visitors who wanted to take their summer holidays home.
“The tail has begun to rock the dog,” Douglas told the Vineyard Gazette in 1997.
Robert Stuart Douglas was born in Chicago on March 18, 1932, and Grace Farwell H. Douglas Jr. of Farwell Douglas and James H. Douglas Jr. began renting a home in the West Chop section of the island in 1947.
Douglas' father served as Air Force secretary and Secretary of Defense under President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Douglas graduated from Northwestern University and joined the Air Force from 1956 to 1958. He was stationed at Hanscomb Air Force Base in Bedford, Massachusetts, where he was able to reunite with his love for New England.
In the summer of 1960 he sailed as a companion on two 19th century ships, and again as a sailor on a replica of the HMS Awards. He sailed from Nova Scotia through the Panama Canal, across the Pacific Ocean, to Tahiti, where he worked as a film sailor for three months.
But he always wanted his own ship. Without formal training as a Marine Corps architect, Douglas designed Shenandoah based on an original design from 1850 and launched a schooner at Vineyard Haven Harbor in 1964. Douglas has captained the ship for over 50 years, and learned how to bring adults for cruises and school children to become friends with deckhands.
Young people “just big big sponge, they can't get enough,” he told the vineyard's official gazette in 2013.
Another schooner, Alabama, joined the fleet in 1967.
In 1970 he married a fellow sailor, Charlene Lapointe, who survived Mr. Douglas. His four sons, Robert Jr., Jamie, Morgan and Brook – also survived him. All four sons reach out to family businesses at various points, including working in retail stores, skipping ships and managing the Black Dog Apparel business.
In the vineyards, Mr. Douglas, or Captain Douglas, whom he is known to define his legacy by his commitment to maritime history. He decorated the tavern with museum-quality voyage works he'd collected over the years, including boat models from the 17th and 18th centuries.
However, the image of Mutt, a rescue, became a calling card for Martha's vineyards and evidence of her island-sized summer club membership.
The mail order business in the late 1980s attacked the business by sending apparel pages to more than 200,000 customers. The company was supported by Rolling Stone in 1991. He took photos of three women wearing long-claimed black dog hats in magazines to solidify the brand's cool status.
Bill Clinton, a frequent island visitor during his presidency, was filmed on Black Dog Gear. He was scrutinized during his investigation of his bounce each, who purchased his two T-shirts, a hat and a sundress from a black dog.
The Lab Mix Black Dog, who started it all, passed away in 1983, but Douglas had other rescue dogs throughout his life.
