Clarification: Captains Courageous Festival letter

Yesterday the Gloucester Daily Times printed our editor Greg Cook's letter about the upcoming Captains Courageous Festival in Gloucester on March 6. He has asked us to clarify some things about the letter because of editing that was done by the newspaper without his input. And though he wrote in his capacity as commodore of the Society for the Preservation of Fitz Hugh Lane, which is independent of our projects here, we've decided to let him use our platform to explain. Mr. Cook insists that a grammatical error was introduced into the first sentence of letter by the newspaper – but he believes this makes his letter better. We reproduce both the newspaper's version and Cook's original here for you to make your own decisions.

As it appeared in the Feb. 25 Gloucester Daily Times:

Letter to the editor: Ahoy! Captains Courageous!

To the editor:

I look forward with much excitement to the Captains Courageous Festival on March 6, as I'm sure all Cape Ann residents are.

And though I know it is probably impossible to make any additions to this great event at this late date, I'd like to hereby officially propose adding a screening of the 1994 film "Cabin Boy," a comedy update of the 1937 "Captains Courageous" film starring David Letterman, Bob Elliot and Chris Elliott (son of the famed Bob Elliott, of Bob & Ray),

It may not be a great film or a greatly funny film, but it's "Captains Courageous" — and any self-respecting "Captains Courageous" fest would benefit from having it.

GREGORY A. COOK
Commodore
Society for the Preservation of Fitz Hugh Lane

Mr. Cook's original letter:

Ahoy, Captains Courageous Fest!

I look forward with much excitement to the Captains Courageous Festival on March 6, as I’m sure all Cape Ann residents do. And though I know it is probably impossible to make any additions to this great event at this late date, I’d like to hereby officially propose adding a screening of the 1994 film "Cabin Boy," a comedy update of the 1937 "Captains Courageous" film starring Chris Elliott (son of the famed Bob (Elliott) & Ray), David Letterman, Bob Elliott, and maybe someone else you might have heard of. It's not a great film. Or a very good film. Or very funny. But it's "Captains Courageous" and any self-respecting "Captains Courageous" fest would benefit from having it.

Sincerely,

Gregory A. Cook
Commodore
The Society for the Preservation of Fitz Hugh Lane