As the Dutch came to dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht was a leisure craft used mostly by royalty and later by the burghers on the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing was incidental, arising as private matches. English yachting originated 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 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), 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 was found to be fashionable with the rich and nobility, but after that point the fashion did not last.
The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was started in about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard association, and had large naval panoply and gravity. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued an imaginary enemy. The club persisted, for the large part as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, by merging with other clubs, it became the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).
Yacht racing began in some organized manner on the Thames about the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland instigated the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV ascended to sovereignty in 1820, it came to be known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded following a racing dispute, 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 patronage 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 rise of George IV. All members were required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for large stakes were held, and the social life was superlative. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats grew in size to bigger than 350 tons.
In North America, yachting was first accomplished with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English took dominance. Sailing was for the most part for fun and rose to its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which traveled on the Mediterranean Sea and created a benchmark of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht group, the Detroit Boat Club, was instigated in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens instigated the New York Yacht Club while on board his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The Early sailing yachts took the lines of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the latter half of the 19th century. The design of bigger yachts was first greatly affected by the win of America, which was created by George Steers for a group started by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) had its namesake after its success at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and manufactured in a contemporary sense, with merely 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 research of aerodynamics do for the structure of sails and rigging what such study had previously done for hulls.
Because almost all sailboats had been individually manufactured, there came a need for handicapping boats previous to the one-design class boats were made. Therefore, a rating rule was created, which ended up in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and edited in 1919. In the present day, one of the most rapidly growing areas in sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are created to standard dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other aspects (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing for these boats can be held on an even par with no handicapping required. A prime example is the standard International America’s Cup Class taken on for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
For the time that yachting was an activity mostly for the nobility and the affluent, expense was no problem, and the size of boats developed, in both length and weight. The promotion and popularity of smaller craft happened in the second 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 voyage around the world (1895–98) sailed single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the seaworthiness of small craft. Thereafter in the 20th century, for the larger part after World War II, smaller racing and recreational craft became more popular, down to the dinghy, a favourite training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, boats of less than 3 m were sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, during which steam began to take the place of sail power in commercial boats, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly favoured in leisure boats. Bigger power yachts were progressed to a high degree, and long-distance sailing turned into a fond occupation of the well off. The first power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave way to boats powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant yachts, auxiliaries possessing both sail and power were the yacht standard for several years. By the later half of the 20th century, several yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were exclusively power yachts that had gasoline or diesel engines.
During the last decade of the 19th century there was a rise in the design of large steam yachts. Notably of these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing 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 saw active service in World War II.
As larger and more dependable internal-combustion engines were developed, many big craft began using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, was furthered during World War I. From the decade after, large power-yacht creation flourished, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. In that period the best auxiliary yacht built was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The building of bigger power boats lessened in 1932, and the fashion from then was for smaller, less expensive boats. After World War II, many small naval vessels were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting has become a widespread loved activity enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen who are actually owning and keeping their own small recreational craft. The popularity of craft and sailors is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional places by the beach but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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