Elissa: A Crown for a Queen (1986)

Presented by the Galveston Historical Foundation, Elissa: A Crown for a Queen is a television documentary directed by University of Houston alumnus Robert Cozens, the director of Film Operations at KUHT, Houston’s PBS affiliate. It was broadcast on local PBS stations on June 25, 1986 and nationally that fall. The film traces the monumental efforts of the Galveston Historical Foundation to restore the sailing ship Elissa, from the immense difficulty of raising the necessary funds to the technical dilemma of re-fabricating a nineteenth-century ship with twentieth-century suppliers.