Yachting and Yacht Clubs
As the Dutch rose to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht became a pleasure craft used first by royalty and then by the burghers on the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing yachts was incidental, borne from private challenges. English yachting originated 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) leisure 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 more 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 was found to be popular with the wealthy and nobility, but after that point the fashion did not last.
The first yacht group in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed at about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard group, and had much naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to racing boats was the “chase,” in which the “fleet” pursued an imaginary enemy. The club persisted, for the large part as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when merging with other organisations, it became the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing was first seen in some stipulated manner on the Thames around the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV rose to the throne in 1820, it was then called the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded with a racing dispute, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht club had been started at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal patronage made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the continuing setting of British yachting. The organisation at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the ascension of George IV. Every member was required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for large bids were held, and the social life was lovely. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats grew in size to over 350 tons.
In North America, yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English held control. Sailing was mostly for leisure and found its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and established a standard of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first continuing 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 followed the lines 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 first heavily affected by the victory 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.) had its namesake after its victory at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and crafted in the modern sense, with merely a model being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was called 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 such study had done earlier for hulls.
Because nearly all sailboats were individually built, there came a requirement for handicapping boats before the one-design class boats were made. Hence, a rating rule was decreed, which is found in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and revised in 1919. In the present day, one of the rapidly flourishing areas in the field of sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are manufactured to standard dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other aspects (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing between such boats can be had on an even playing field with no handicapping required. A perfect example is the generic International America’s Cup Class taken on board for yachts in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
For the time that yachting was done largely for the royal and the affluent, expense was no issue, and the size of boats developed, in both length and weight. The ascendancy and desire of smaller boats happened 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 voyage around the world (1895–98) led single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray made plain the seaworthiness of small boats. Later in the 20th century, particularly after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure craft became more common, down to the dinghy, a popular training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, yachts of less than 3 m were sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, during which steam began to emulate sail power in public craft, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly employed in personal yachts. Bigger power yachts were furthered to a high standard, and long-distance cruising turned into a preferred activity of the well off. The first power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave rise to yachts powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller kind of propulsion. As well as naval and merchant craft, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht archetype for a number of years. By the latter half of the 20th century, many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the large part were only power yachts containing gasoline or diesel engines.
In the last decade of the 19th century there was a rise in the manufacture of large steam yachts. In particular among these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was manned by a crew of over 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 gave active service for World War II.
As more sizeable and more dependable internal-combustion engines were developed, many bigger craft were using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, using heavy oil for fuel, was furthered in World War I. From the decade following, big power-yacht building blossomed, climaxing in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. In that period the best auxiliary yacht constructed was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The building of larger power boats declined after 1932, and the trend from then was for smaller, less pricey craft. From World War II, lots of small naval craft were traded by private owners for conversion to yachts. In the late 20th century, yachting has become a widespread popular sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen who are actually owning and keeping their own small leisure yachts. The popularity of boats and yachtsmen is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional places by the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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