As the Dutch found preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht had been a leisure craft used initially by royalty and later by the burghers for the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing 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 monarchy 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, sovereign 1685–88), made more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and returning, on a £100 wager. Yachting became classy for the wealthy and royalty, but after that period the habit did not last.
The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was instigated around about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard association, with large naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” for which the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club went on, mostly as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when conglomerating with other societies, it became known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing began in some ordered method on the Thames in the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland funded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to the throne in 1820, it was known as 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 society 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 location of British racing. The association at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the accession of George IV. Every member was required to possess boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for great bets were held, and the club life was superlative. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to bigger than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting started with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and continued when the English held dominance. Sailing was for the most part for pleasure and reached its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which cruised on the Mediterranean Sea and established a standard of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht group, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens began the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The first sailing yachts were within the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century through to the second half of the 19th century. The craft of bigger yachts was originally largely put upon by the victory of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a club started 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 built in a contemporary sense, with just a model for an outline. Not until the later half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come about. Not until the 1920s did the application of the science of aerodynamics do for the craft of sails and rigging what science had earlier done for hulls.
Because almost all sailboats were individually manufactured, there came a need for handicapping boats before the one-design class boats were made. Therefore, a rating rule came into being, which ended up in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and amended in 1919. In modern times, one of the most rapidly growing areas in the sailing industry 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 those boats can be had on an even playing field with no handicapping necessary. A great example is the standard International America’s Cup Class adopted for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
As long as yachting was done mostly for the aristocracy and the rich, money was no problem, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The rise and preference of smaller craft occurred in the later 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) sailed single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the hardiness of smaller craft. Following this in the 20th century, particularly after World War II, smaller racing and recreational yachts became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a favourite training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, craft of less than 3 m were sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
After the decade 1840–50, when steam started to emulate sail power in public craft, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were used increasingly in pleasure craft. Sizeable power yachts were furthered to a high element, and long-distance cruising turned into a preferred activity of the rich. The earliest power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; those then made way to yachts powered by the wholly 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 standard for several years. By the second half of the 20th century, many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were solely power yachts with 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, that had triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was manned by a crew of more than 150. The Mayflower, bought 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 large yachts began using them for power. The development of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, progressed for World War I. From the decade following that, big power-yacht creation flourished, reaching a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. During that point the best auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The manufacture of large power boats declined in 1932, and the trend thereafter was for smaller, less expensive boats. From World War II, a lot of small naval vessels were bought by private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting is a globally beloved sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen who are actually manning and maintaining their own small pleasure boats. The number of boats and yachtsmen is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional places by the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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