Updated 31 May 2024:
We found Great Hope (originally called Ashlee) in 2009 on exhibit in front of Great Hope Golf Course in Somerset County, Maryland. She disappeared from there and her current location, if she still exists, is unknown.
Great Hope is a small skipjack built by Frank Lawrence of Greenbankville, Virginia, on the eastern side of Delmarva Peninsula. Her original name was Ashlee, named after Lawrence's two granddaughters, Ashley and Lee. She was the first and only boat he ever built, using plans from the Wooden Boat School. Lawrence had family roots in Oriole, Maryland, a significant shipbuilding area in the 1900s. Construction took about two years, during which he harvested his own trees for the wood used. Ashlee was christened in June 2000.
Lawrence sailed her out of Captain's Cove on Chincoteague Bay. But as the years went by, the deck boards were rotting, and he couldn't keep up with maintenance. Not wanting to sell her, he donated her to Great Hope Golf Course in Westover, Maryland, on the road to Crisfield.
We found her there in 2009, on display on the golf course grounds, having adopted the name of the course. She eventually disappeared from there, and we have no further information as to her whereabouts.