Yachting and Yacht Clubs
As the Dutch came to dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht was a leisure craft used mostly by royalty and later by the burghers for the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing was incidental, borne from private matches. English yachting began with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his restoration to the English royalty in 1660, the city of Amsterdam sent him 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, sovereign 1685–88), made additional yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and the same way back, on a £100 bet. Yachting became classy with the rich and royalty, but after that period the trend did not last.
The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was instigated in about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, and held much naval panoply and gravity. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued a fictional enemy. The club went on, mostly as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, by joining with other clubs, it was known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing began in some ordered 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 rose to sovereignty in 1820, it was then called the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing argument, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht club had been formed 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 continuing site of British racing. The society at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the rise of George IV. Each member was required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing races for high bets were held, and the social life was superlative. Eventually Royal Yachting Club boats were raised in size to more than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English gained power. Sailing was largely for fun and rose to its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and set a minimum of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht club, the Detroit Boat Club, was started in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens founded the New York Yacht Club while on board his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The first sailing yachts took the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the second half of the 19th century. The design of bigger yachts was originally heavily impacted by the success of America, which was designed by George Steers for a club headed by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) was named after its win at Cowes in 1851. Early yachts were not designed and built in today’s sense, with just a model being used. Not until the second half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come about. Not until the 1920s did the use of the study of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what such science had previously done for hulls.
Because almost all sailboats had been individually built, there was a requirement for handicapping boats as this was previous to the one-design class boats were made. Hence, a rating rule was created, which is found in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and amended in 1919. In modern times, one of the rapidly growing areas in the field of sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are created to the same specifications in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing such boats can be had on an even par with no handicapping necessary. A perfect example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class adopted for yachts in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
So long as yachting was done largely for the nobility and the affluent, expense was no object, and the size of boats developed, in both length and weight. The promotion and desire of smaller yachts happened in the second 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 trip around the world (1895–98) led single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the hardiness of small yachts. Following this in the 20th century, particularly after World War II, smaller racing and recreational boats became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, boats of less than 3 m were setting sail single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, at which point steam started to emulate sail power in public boats, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were employed more and more in personal craft. Bigger power yachts were furthered to a high degree, and long-distance sailing was a preferred activity of the well off. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; those then gave way to boats powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller sort of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht archetype for many years. By the latter half of the 20th century, a lot of yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were only power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.
From the last decade of the 19th century there was a rise in the design of bigger steam yachts. Notably among these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was sailed by a crew of at least 150. The Mayflower, commissioned by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and saw active service during World War II.
As larger and more dependable internal-combustion engines were created, many bigger yachts started using them for power. The development of the diesel engine, employing heavy oil for fuel, progressed in World War I. From the decade after that, large power-yacht manufacture flourished, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. In that point the biggest auxiliary yacht constructed was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The building of bigger power craft lessened after 1932, and the trend thereafter was toward smaller, less pricey boats. Following World War II, many small naval craft were traded by private owners for conversion to yachts. By the late 20th century, yachting is a internationally beloved competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen who are actually owning and maintaining their own small pleasure craft. The number of craft and sailors is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional places on the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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