Yachting and Yacht Clubs
July 16th, 2010
As the Dutch found dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the initial yacht was a pleasure craft used first by royalty and then by the burghers for the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing yachts was incidental, arising as private games. English yachting began with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his return to the English monarchy in 1660, the city of Amsterdam presented him with a 20-metre (66-foot) pleasure boat with a beam (maximum width) of 5.6 m (18 feet), which he then named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, ruled 1685–88), made more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and the same way back, on a £100 wager. Yachting rose as popular among the wealthy and aristocracy, but after that period the trend did not last.
The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed at about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard group, with much naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued an imaginary enemy. The club went on, largely as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when joining with other clubs, it was known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing was first seen in some stipulated fashion on the Thames in the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland instigated the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV ascended to the throne in 1820, it was called the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded with a racing argument, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht society had been started at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal sponsorship made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the perpetual site of British yacht racing. The organisation at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, also at the accession of George IV. Every member was required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for great stakes were held, and the social life was superlative. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats were raised in size to over 350 tons.
In North America, yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and went on when the English held dominance. Sailing was for the most part for fun and rose to its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which cruised on the Mediterranean Sea and created a minimum of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht group, the Detroit Boat Club, was started in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens instigated the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The Early sailing yachts followed the lines of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century through to the later half of the 19th century. The design of sizeable yachts was initially largely put upon by the win of America, which was designed by George Steers for a association led by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) found its namesake after its success at Cowes in 1851. Earlier yachts were not designed and manufactured in today’s sense, with only a model for an outline. Not until the later half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come into action. Not until the 1920s did the application of the science of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what it had earlier done for hulls.
Because almost all sailboats had to be individually custom-built, there came a need for handicapping boats before the one-design class boats were designed. Hence, a rating rule was written, which ended up in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and revised in 1919. In the present day, one of the rapidly flourishing areas in sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are manufactured to the same requirements in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing those boats can be done on an even keel with no handicapping at all. A perfect example is the generic International America’s Cup Class adopted for racers in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
So long as yachting was done mostly for the aristocracy and the affluent, cost was no issue, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The promotion and preference of smaller craft came in the latter half of the 19th century out of the sailing of the Englishmen R.T. McMullen, a stockbroker, and E.F. Knight, a barrister and journalist. A journey around the world (1895–98) led single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the value of less sizeable boats. Later in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and recreational craft became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a favourite training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, boats of less than 3 m were sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Following the decade 1840–50, at which point steam began to take the place of sail power in public craft, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were employed more and more in leisure boats. Bigger power yachts were progressed to a high degree, and long-distance travel was a favoured pastime of the rich. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; those then made way to those powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller sort of propulsion. As well as naval and merchant craft, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht archetype for many years. By the later half of the 20th century, many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the larger part were solely power yachts that had gasoline or diesel engines.
During the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the design of more sizeable steam yachts. Notably of these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, that had triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was operated by a crew of more than 150. The Mayflower, purchased by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and was used in active service during World War II.
As larger and better quality internal-combustion engines were produced, many large yachts were using them for power. The development of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, progressed in World War I. During the decade following that, bigger power-yacht creation grew, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. During that period the biggest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The construction of larger power boats lessened in 1932, and the trend from then was in preference of smaller, less costly craft. From World War II, lots of small naval boats were bought by private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting is a widespread popular sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen who are actually sailing and keeping their own small recreational craft. The popularity of yachts and yachtsmen is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional locations by the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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