As the Dutch rose to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the first yacht had been a leisure craft used first by royalty and later by the burghers in the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, coming out of private matches. English yachting started 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 sent 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, 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 wager. Yachting became fashionable for the affluent and royalty, but after that period the trend 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, with great naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” in which the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club endured, for the large part 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 ordered manner on the Thames in the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland instigated the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to monarchy in 1820, it was then known as 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 group 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 continued site of British racing. The association at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the ascension of George IV. Each member was required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for high bets were held, and the club life was splendid. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to more than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting started with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English held dominance. Sailing was for the most part for leisure and reached its epitome in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and set a standard of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht association, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens instigated the New York Yacht Club aboard his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The first sailing yachts followed the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the second half of the 19th century. The craft of bigger yachts was initially greatly put upon by the success of America, which was designed by George Steers for a association led by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) had its namesake after its win at Cowes in 1851. Earlier yachts were not designed and manufactured in the modern sense, with just a model used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was called naval architecture come about. Not until the 1920s did the use of the science of aerodynamics do for the craft of sails and rigging what science had earlier done for hulls.
Because most of all sailboats were individually manufactured, there was a requirement for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were made. Thus, a rating rule was decreed, which ended up in the International Rule, accepted in 1906 and amended in 1919. In modern times, one of the most rapidly blossoming areas in sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are built to single requirements in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing for such boats can be done on an even playing field with no handicapping at all. A prime example is the standard International America’s Cup Class taken on board for racers in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
So long as yachting was an activity mostly for the nobility and the rich, money was no problem, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The promotion and preference of smaller boats happened in the second 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 trip around the world (1895–98) captained single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray made plain the hardiness of less sizeable boats. Following this in the 20th century, for the larger part after World War II, smaller racing and leisure craft became more common, 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 take the place of sail power in market boats, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were used increasingly in personal boats. Large power yachts were developed to a high degree, and long-distance cruising turned into a preferred activity of the wealthy. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave way to yachts powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As well as naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht fashion for a number of years. By the second half of the 20th century, several 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 of these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, with 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 was used in active service in World War II.
As larger and more reliable internal-combustion engines were produced, many big boats began using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, was furthered for World War I. During the decade after that, large power-yacht building flourished, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. From that period the biggest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The manufacture of large power boats lessened after 1932, and the style 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. In the late 20th century, yachting had become a widespread loved sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen personally sailing and maintaining their own small recreational boats. The amount of craft and owners has increased steadily, not only in the traditional areas on the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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