Save your spare change for the Falls of Clyde.

The folks working to restore the historic vessel berthed at Pier 7 near Aloha Tower want to collect 1 million quarters — $250,000 — in their next fundraising effort.

The Friends of the Falls of Clyde kicks off its fundraising on June 30 at the Dillingham Transportation Building on Bishop Street near the harbor. The Friends plan to distribute tin cans at businesses that deal with the public. People could drop a quarter into a tin can to help with the restoration.

The group's goal is one million quarters. Friends President Bruce McEwan said the group hopes to distribute the cans all over the state.

"We're going to try to get a lot of people to give a little to buy into a big piece of history," he said.

McEwan said yesterday that the 130-year-old ship will go into drydock at Marisco Ltd. at Barbers Point on July 20.

Plans call for the Falls of Clyde to be in drydock for 10 days, said McEwan, who is an executive for Young Brothers. He said Marisco has agreed to do the work for about $30,000, which is a reduced rate.

Friends Vice President Chris Woolaway said other players in the Hawai'i maritime business have indicated that they will support the effort to restore the Falls.

The iron-hulled, four-masted Falls, designated as a National Historic Landmark, was constructed in 1878 in Scotland, and was named after a waterfall on the River Clyde. In 1899, it was brought to Honolulu, where it served as a trans-Pacific passenger and freight-carrying vessel.

She was saved once before, in the early 1960s.

Back then, the ship was set to be scuttled after it was no longer needed as an oil tanker.

But a campaign in the Islands to keep it afloat gained momentum and public support. Following a big fundraising effort, the ship was opened to the public at Honolulu Harbor in 1968 — when Bishop Museum acquired it — then remasted in 1970.

Longtime Honolulu Advertiser columnist Bob Krauss championed the push to save the Falls of Clyde, campaigning in person and through numerous columns to preserve the ship, as well as donating thousands of dollars to the effort. Krauss died in 2006.

Last year the museum announced that it could no longer pay to maintain the vessel and said it would sink it if no interested parties came forward with a plan to save it. The museum gave the Falls to the Friends group last September.

Yesterday about a dozen members of the Friends gathered at Pier 7 to discuss their plans and to perform some minor chores sprucing up the old ship.

McEwan, who met his wife, Lillian Cunningham, at a party aboard the Falls in 1976, said no one would know how much work is needed or what it would cost until after the drydock inspection. But he said the Friends are in for the long haul.

John Wright, who has helped lead efforts to preserve the Falls for more than 40 years, is one of those determined souls. He sat on the pier yesterday and talked about the old ship like an old friend.

"She is unique in the world," Wright said, "and she deserves world-class attention."