Yachting and Yacht Clubs

As the Dutch rose to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht became a leisure craft used first by royalty and later by the burghers for the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing yachts 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 reaffirmation 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 called Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, sovereign 1685 88), ordered for more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and returning, on a 100 punt. Yachting rose as popular among the affluent and royalty, but after that time the fashion did not last.

The first yacht group in the British Isles, the Water Club, was instigated around about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, and held much naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to racing was the chase, for which the fleet pursued an imaginary enemy. The club endured, mostly as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, after merging with other societies, it became known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

Yacht racing was seen in some organized 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 the throne in 1820, it came to be named the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing dispute, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht organisation 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 perpetual site of British racing. The society at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the rise 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 social life was splendid. 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 went on when the English took control. Sailing was mostly for pleasure and reached its epitome in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and created a benchmark of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht organisation, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens founded the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats
The Early sailing yachts took the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the latter half of the 19th century. The craft of bigger yachts was first greatly impacted by the victory of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a club led 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. Early yachts were not designed and crafted in the modern sense, with just a model being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was called naval architecture come about. Not until the 1920s did the employment of the research of aerodynamics do for the structure of sails and rigging what such study had previously done for hulls.

Because almost all sailboats had to be individually built, there was a requirement for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were made. Thus, a rating rule was created, which ended up in the International Rule, accepted in 1906 and edited in 1919. Today, 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 the same dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing these boats can be had on an even par with no handicapping necessary. A prime example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class adopted for racers in the 1992 America’s Cup race.

For the time that yachting was an activity primarily for the royal and the rich, expense was no object, and the size of boats developed, in both length and weight. The rise and desire of smaller boats happened in the second 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 journey around the world (1895 98) captained single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray proved the value of smaller craft. Later in the 20th century, for the larger part after World War II, smaller racing and recreational 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 was set to emulate sail power in commercial boats, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were employed more and more in pleasure vessels. Sizeable power yachts were developed to a high element, and long-distance cruising turned into a preferred pastime of the affluent. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; they then gave way to those powered by the fully submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht archetype for several years. By the later half of the 20th century, several yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were solely power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.

In the last decade of the 19th century there was a push in the design of large steam yachts. In particular 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 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 bigger and more reliable internal-combustion engines were developed, many large boats were using them for power. The development of the diesel engine, using heavy oil for fuel, progressed for World War I. In the decade after that, large power-yacht manufacture blossomed, reaching a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. During that time the biggest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.

The building of larger power boats declined in 1932, and the fashion from then was for smaller, less costly yachts. After World War II, a lot of small naval craft were bought by private owners for conversion to yachts. By the late 20th century, yachting is a widespread popular competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually manning and upkeeping their own small pleasure yachts. The number of boats and yachtsmen increased steadily, not only in the traditional places along the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.

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