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 on the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, coming out of private games. English yachting started with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his return to the English royalty in 1660, the city of Amsterdam presented him with a 20-metre (66-foot) leisure 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 back, on a £100 bet. Yachting rose as fashionable for the wealthy and royalty, but after that time the habit did not last.
The first yacht group in the British Isles, the Water Club, was instigated at about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, with much naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to racing boats 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, by merging with other groups, it became 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 founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to monarchy in 1820, it was known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded with a racing argument, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht society had been started 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 location of British yachting. The society at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the rise of George IV. Each member was required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for large bids were held, and the society life was lovely. Eventually Royal Yachting Club boats were raised in size to over 350 tons.
In North America, yachting started with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English took dominance. Sailing was largely for fun and found its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which traveled on the Mediterranean Sea and created a minimum of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in those waters from the late 19th century. The first persisting American yacht society, the Detroit Boat Club, was instigated in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens founded the New York Yacht Club aboard his schooner Gimcrack.
Kinds of sailboats
The Early sailing yachts followed 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 sizeable yachts was initially heavily impacted by the win of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a association led by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) found 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 being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was labeled naval architecture come into action. Not until the 1920s did the application of the research of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what such science had earlier done for hulls.
Because nearly all sailboats had to be individually manufactured, there was a requirement for handicapping boats previous to the one-design class boats were built. Hence, a rating rule came into being, which resulted in the International Rule, accepted in 1906 and revised in 1919. In the present day, one of the most rapidly growing areas in the field of sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are manufactured to standard requirements in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing between these boats can be held on an even keel with no handicapping required. A prime example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class taken on board for yachts in the 1992 America’s Cup race.
So long as yachting belonged mostly for the nobility and the rich, money was no problem, and the size of boats increased, in both length and weight. The promotion and popularity of smaller boats occurred 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 journey around the world (1895–98) captained single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray made plain the value of small yachts. Later in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and leisure yachts became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, boats of less than 3 m were setting sail single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.
Kinds of power yachts
Following the decade 1840–50, in which steam was set to replace sail power in commercial vessels, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly used in pleasure yachts. Sizeable power yachts were furthered to a high element, and long-distance cruising turned into a fond pastime of the well off. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; they then gave way to boats powered by the wholly submerged screw or propeller sort of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant boats, auxiliaries with both sail and power were the yacht archetype for many years. By the second half of the 20th century, several yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were only power yachts containing gasoline or diesel engines.
From the last decade of the 19th century there was a rise in the construction of bigger steam yachts. Notably 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, commissioned by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and gave active service in World War II.
As bigger and more reliable internal-combustion engines were created, many big boats began using them for power. The creation of the diesel engine, employing heavy oil for fuel, progressed for World War I. From the decade that followed, large power-yacht creation flourished, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. In that point the largest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.
The manufacture of large power yachts declined after 1932, and the trend thereafter was in preference of smaller, less expensive yachts. From World War II, lots of small naval vessels were bought by private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting is a widespread loved sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually owning and maintaining their own small recreational yachts. The popularity of boats and owners has increased steadily, not only in the traditional places along the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.
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