Yachting and Yacht Clubs
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As the Dutch rose to dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the first yacht was a pleasure craft used initially by royalty and later by the burghers in the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing was incidental, arising as 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 named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, reigned 1685–88), built other 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 fashionable among the rich and royalty, but after that time the trend did not last.
The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed in about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, with great naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” in which the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club persisted, largely as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, after joining with other organisations, it became the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing began in some stipulated manner on the Thames around the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland instigated the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV ascended to monarchy in 1820, it was called the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded following a racing argument, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht association had been formed at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal funding made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the continued site of British racing. The organisation at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, again at the accession of George IV. Every member was required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for large bets were held, and the club life was superlative. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to more than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting was first accomplished with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and continued when the English held dominance. Sailing was largely for fun and rose to its epitome in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which traveled on the Mediterranean Sea and established a minimum of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht association, the Detroit Boat Club, was started 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 through to the second half of the 19th century. The design of bigger yachts was first largely put upon by the win of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a group started by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) found its namesake after its win at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and built in the modern sense, with merely a model used. 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 use of the research of aerodynamics do for the structure of sails and rigging what such study had previously done for hulls.
Because most of all sailboats were individually built, there arose a requirement for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were designed. Hence, a rating rule was written, which ended up in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and edited in 1919. In modern times, one of the fastest blossoming areas in sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are manufactured to single specifications in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing such boats can be held on an even par with no handicapping required. A perfect example is the standard International America’s Cup Class taken on board for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
As long as yachting was done largely for the aristocracy and the wealthy, expense was no object, and the size of boats increased, in both length and weight. The ascendancy and preference of smaller craft happened in the latter half of the 19th century from 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 hardiness of smaller boats. Later in the 20th century, for the larger part after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure yachts became more popular, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, yachts of less than 3 m were traveled in single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, in which steam started to emulate sail power in public vessels, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly employed in personal craft. Bigger power yachts were furthered to a high standard, and long-distance cruising turned into a favourite activity of the affluent. The earliest power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; those then made way to boats powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. Like naval and merchant craft, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht standard for many years. By the latter half of the 20th century, many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the large part were only power yachts that had gasoline or diesel engines.
From the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the design of more sizeable steam yachts. Conspicuous of these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was operated 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 saw active service for World War II.
As larger and more reliable internal-combustion engines were created, many bigger craft began using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, progressed in World War I. From the decade following that, big power-yacht manufacture flourished, climaxing in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. From that point the biggest auxiliary yacht constructed was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The manufacture of large power craft lessened after 1932, and the fashion thereafter was toward smaller, less costly craft. After World War II, lots of small naval boats were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting had become a globally beloved competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually owning and keeping their own small recreational yachts. The amount of craft and yachtsmen has increased steadily, not only in the traditional locations by the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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