Yachting and Yacht Clubs
As the Dutch came to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht was a pleasure craft used first by royalty and secondly by the burghers in the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, coming out of private challenges. English yachting began with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his restoration to the English throne in 1660, the city of Amsterdam gave 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, reigned 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 became popular for the rich and aristocracy, but after that period the fashion did not last.
The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed in about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, and held much naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” in which the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club went on, largely as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when joining with other groups, it was known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing was first seen in some organized method on the Thames about the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland funded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV rose to sovereignty in 1820, it was known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded following a racing fight, 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 patronage made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the continuing location of British racing. The club at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the ascension of George IV. All members were required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing races for high bets were held, and the social life was splendid. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats grew in size to more than 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 mostly for leisure and found its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which traveled on the Mediterranean Sea and set a standard of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in those waters from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht group, the Detroit Boat Club, was instigated in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens began the New York Yacht Club while on board his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
Early sailing yachts were within the style of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the later half of the 19th century. The style of large yachts was originally heavily affected by the success of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a association started by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) was named after its victory at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and crafted in today’s sense, with merely a model being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was labeled naval architecture come about. Not until the 1920s did the use of the study of aerodynamics do for the structure of sails and rigging what science had previously done for hulls.
Because nearly all sailboats had been individually custom-built, there arose a need for handicapping boats as this was previous to the one-design class boats were designed. Thus, a rating rule was decreed, which is found in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and revised in 1919. Today, one of the fastest growing areas in the field of sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are created to single dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other areas (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing for such boats can be had on an even basis with no handicapping necessary. A perfect example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class taken on board for racers in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
So long as yachting was done primarily for the aristocracy and the affluent, expense was no issue, and the size of boats developed, in both length and weight. The promotion and desire of smaller boats came in the later half of the 19th century in 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) sailed single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the seaworthiness of smaller boats. Thereafter in the 20th century, particularly after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure boats became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, craft of less than 3 m were traveled in single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, at which point steam was set to take the place of sail power in commercial vessels, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly favoured in personal boats. Large power yachts were progressed to a high element, and long-distance travel was a preferred pastime of the rich. The first power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; they then made way to those powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller sort of propulsion. As well as naval and merchant yachts, auxiliaries with both sail and power were the yacht fashion for a number of years. By the second half of the 20th century, a lot of yachts were still auxiliaries, but the larger part were only power yachts that had gasoline or diesel engines.
During the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the construction of more sizeable steam yachts. In particular within 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 at least 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 more sizeable and better quality internal-combustion engines were produced, many large yachts started using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, using heavy oil for fuel, was furthered during World War I. From the decade following that, big power-yacht manufacture grew, reaching a climax 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 manufacture of big power yachts lessened from 1932, and the fashion after that was toward smaller, less costly craft. After World War II, a lot of small naval boats were traded by private owners for conversion to yachts. In the late 20th century, yachting had become a widespread beloved activity enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually owning and upkeeping their own small leisure craft. The number of yachts and sailors increased steadily, not only in the traditional locations by the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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