As the Dutch came to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the first yacht had been a leisure craft used initially by royalty and later by the burghers for the canals as well as the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing was incidental, arising as private matches. English yachting started with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his return to the English throne 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 then named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, ruled 1685–88), made other 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 point the habit did not last.
The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was started at about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard association, with much naval panoply and gravity. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” in which the “fleet” pursued a fictional enemy. The club went on, mostly as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, after joining with other groups, it became known as 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 funded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV rose to monarchy in 1820, it was then known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing fight, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht club 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 perpetual site of British yachting. The organisation at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, also at the ascension of George IV. All members were required to possess boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for large bids were held, and the social life was lovely. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats grew in size to bigger than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English had dominance. Sailing was mostly for pleasure and reached its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which cruised on the Mediterranean Sea and created a benchmark of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht society, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens instigated the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The first sailing yachts followed 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 large yachts was first heavily affected by the win of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a club headed by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) found its namesake after its victory at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and built in the modern sense, with merely a model used. Not until the second half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come into action. Not until the 1920s did the application of the research of aerodynamics do for the craft of sails and rigging what such study had earlier done for hulls.
Because almost all sailboats were individually built, there was a requirement for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were made. Hence, a rating rule was created, which is found in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and revised in 1919. In modern times, one of the most rapidly flourishing areas in the sailing industry 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 aspects (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing such boats can be had on an even keel with no handicapping at all. A great example is the standard International America’s Cup Class taken on board for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
For the time that yachting was done mostly for the royal and the rich, expense was no object, and the size of boats increased, in both length and weight. The promotion and popularity of smaller craft came in the later half of the 19th century out of 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) led single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the seaworthiness of less sizeable boats. Thereafter in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure craft became more popular, down to the dinghy, a favoured 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
After the decade 1840–50, when steam began to replace sail power in market vessels, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were employed increasingly in leisure boats. Sizeable power yachts were progressed to a high element, and long-distance travel was a fond pastime of the well off. The earliest power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then made way to boats powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. Like naval and merchant boats, auxiliaries carrying both sail and power were the yacht fashion for many years. By the latter half of the 20th century, a lot of yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were exclusively power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.
From the last decade of the 19th century there was a rise in the design of large steam yachts. In particular within these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, that had triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was sailed 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 saw active service in World War II.
As bigger and better quality internal-combustion engines were developed, many big yachts started using them for power. The creation of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, was furthered in World War I. From the decade after, bigger power-yacht manufacture grew, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. From that period the largest auxiliary yacht constructed was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The building of bigger power craft declined in 1932, and the fashion from then was in preference of smaller, less costly boats. From World War II, a lot of small naval boats were traded by private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting had become a widespread popular competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually manning and keeping their own small recreational craft. The popularity of yachts and owners is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional locations along the beach but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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