yacht

—yachty, adj.

/yot/, n.

1. a vessel used for private cruising, racing, or other noncommercial purposes.

v.i.

2. to sail, voyage, or race in a yacht.

[1550-60; < early D jaght, short for jaghtschip hunting ship, equiv. to D jacht hunt (deriv. of jagen to hunt) + schip SHIP]

* * *

Sail-or motor-driven vessel used for racing or recreation.

The term is popularly applied to large recreational engine-powered boats; the sailboats known as yachts and used for racing are usually light and comparatively small. Until the mid-19th century, yachts were designed along the lines of naval craft such as schooners and cutters. Yacht design was greatly affected by the 1851 success of the America in the race that established the America's Cup. In the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and recreational craft became more common. See also sailing.

* * *

▪ boat

Introduction

 a sail- or power-driven vessel, usually light and comparatively small, used for racing or for recreation. In recreation the term applies to very large craft, originally powered by sail and later by steam or internal-combustion engines. It is in this sense that the generality of nonyachting (nonsailing) people usually think of the term. Technically, the word yacht excludes boats propelled by paddles, oars, or outboard motors. Also, recreational powered craft below the largest size are usually called cabin cruisers (see motorboat).

      The English word yacht and the equivalent word in many European languages comes from the Dutch use in the 16th and 17th centuries of the word jaght, later jacht, which, with the word schip added, meant “ship for chasing.”

Yachting and yacht clubs.

      As the Dutch rose to preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht became a pleasure craft used first by royalty and later by the burghers on the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, arising as private matches. English yachting began 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 presented him with 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, reigned 1685–88), built other yachts and in 1662 raced two of them for a £100 wager on the Thames from Greenwich to Gravesend and back. Yachting became fashionable among the wealthy and nobility, but at that time the fashion did not last.

      The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, with much naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued an imaginary enemy. The club persisted, largely as a social club, until 1765 and in 1828 became, after merging with other groups, the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

      Yacht racing began in some organized fashion on the Thames about the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to the throne in 1820, it came to be called the Fleet to His Majesty's Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing dispute 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 patronage made the Solent, the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight, the continuing site of British yachting. The club at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, again at the accession of George IV. All members were required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for large stakes were held, and the social life was splendid. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to more than 350 tons.

      In North America yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and continued when the English gained control. Sailing was mostly for pleasure and reached its apogee in George Crowinshield's Cleopatra's Barge (1815), which cruised on the Mediterranean Sea and set a standard of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in those waters from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht club, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844 John C. Stevens founded the New York Yacht Club aboard his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats

      Early sailing yachts followed the lines of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the second half of the 19th century. The design of large yachts was first greatly affected by the success of America, which was designed by George Steers for a syndicate headed by John C. Stevens and was the boat for which the America's Cup (q.v.) was named after its victory at Cowes in 1851. Early yachts were not designed and built in the modern sense, only a model being used. Not until the second half of the 19th century did what was called naval architecture come into being. Not until the 1920s did the application of the science of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what science had earlier done for hulls.

 Because nearly all sailboats were individually custom-built, there arose a need for handicapping boats before the one-design class boats were built. Thus, a rating rule came into being, which resulted in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and revised in 1919. Today, one of the fastest growing areas in the field of sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are built to the same specifications in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration—>). Racing between such boats can be held on an even basis with no handicapping necessary. A prime example is the uniform International America's Cup Class adopted for participants in the 1992 America's Cup race.

      So long as yachting belonged primarily to the royal and the rich, cost was no object, and the size of boats increased, in both length and weight. The promotion and popularity of smaller craft came in the second 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 (Slocum, Joshua) in the 11.3-metre Spray demonstrated the seaworthiness of small craft. Thereafter in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and recreational craft became more common, 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.

      After the decade 1840–50, when steam began to replace sail power in commercial vessels, the steam engine and, later, the internal-combustion engine were increasingly employed in pleasure vessels. Large power yachts were developed to a high degree, and long-distance cruising became a favourite pastime of the rich. The earliest power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave way to those powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries carrying both sail and power were the yacht fashion for a number of years. By the second half of the 20th century many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were exclusively power yachts containing gasoline or diesel engines.

      During the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the construction of large steam yachts. Conspicuous among these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull and manned by a crew of more than 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 saw active service during 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, using heavy oil for fuel, advanced during World War I; and, in the decade that followed, large power-yacht building flourished, reaching a climax in the Orion (1930), 3,097 tons. During that period the largest auxiliary yacht built was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931), 2,323 tons.

      The building of large power yachts declined after 1932, and the trend thereafter was toward smaller, less expensive craft. After World War II, many small naval vessels were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. By the late 20th century yachting had become a widespread popular sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen personally manning and maintaining their own small pleasure craft. The number of yachts and yachtsmen increased steadily, not only in the traditional areas along the seacoasts but also on inland waterways and lakes.

Racing clubs.

      In England (United Kingdom) by 1881 most of the important yacht clubs had become members of the Yacht Racing Association (founded 1875; from 1952 called the Royal Yachting Association). The organization made rules governing regatta sailing and later took on duties as a representative body for all British yachting, including dealing with port, harbour, and other governmental authorities. In the United States, where there is much freshwater sailing, yacht clubs were founded between 1849 and 1880 at New Orleans, La.; Detroit, Mich.; Boston; San Francisco; Marblehead, Mass.; Oyster Bay, N.Y.; Chicago; and Larchmont, N.Y. By the late 20th century there were approximately 1,500 active yacht clubs in the United States. The Royal Canadian Yacht Club was founded in 1852, and the Australian Yacht Squadron (later the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron) in 1862. Yacht clubs were founded in a number of countries throughout the world. The North American Racing Union was formed in 1925. A need for a body to set international racing rules and classes resulted in the founding of the International Yacht Racing Union (IYRU) in 1907.

      Yachting organizations with specialized interests also arose, including the Cruising Club of America (founded 1922) and the Royal Ocean Racing Club (founded 1925), both of which are active in offshore and ocean racing. Many other specialized organizations were formed for preparing charts and offering challenge cups for small sailing craft. During the second half of the 20th century, many organizations were formed for boats of one class and design.

Olympic Games.

      The yacht races held in every Olympic meet since 1900, except for 1904, illustrate the general tendency in the period toward smaller boats and, after mid-century, the increasing popularity of one-class racing. Earlier Olympics included races for boats of various sizes and weights. The difficulty and expense of freighting boats and the increasing difficulty of recruiting large amateur crews often led to host countries winning the most races, sometimes by default. After World War II, the number of classes stabilized and the size of boats shrank. There were usually five classes, with 5.5-metre boats predominating, which included a monotype (one-person crew), a two-person centreboard boat, a two-person keeled boat, a three-person one-design boat, and a development boat. Certain models might not appear in Olympic competition one year but again be used in later games. Classes are named by the International Olympic Committee based on recommendations made by the IYRU. Windsurfing was added to the Olympic program in 1984.

Courses.

      Sailboat races are held over two kinds of courses: point-to-point and closed. Most ocean racing is point-to-point, as in transoceanic races, global circumnavigation, the Bermuda Race (q.v.; first raced in 1906 from Newport to Bermuda), and the Transpacific Race (q.v.; first raced in 1906 from California to Hawaii). Such offshore races as the America's Cup and the Fastnet Cup (qq.v.) are closed course and point-to-point, respectively. The One Ton Cup (q.v.), first raced in 1907, came to include both closed course and point-to-point races. Small boat races, on both inland water and inshore oceanic waters, are usually sailed on closed courses, most commonly triangular.

Transatlantic racing and global circumnavigation.

      Ocean racing began in 1866 with a match race held under NYYC rules from Sandy Hook, Conn., to Cowes, Isle of Wight, Eng., by three schooners of 32- to 32.6-metre length: Fleetwing, Vesta, and Henrietta. Henrietta, owned by the American newspaper publisher James Gordon Bennett, won in 13 days of sailing. The first single-sailor transatlantic voyage was made in a 6-metre boat by Alfred Johnson in 1876 to commemorate the centenary of U.S. independence. The first single-handed race in 1891 was won by the American sailor Si Lawlor. A series of single-handed races, sponsored by the London Observer, began in 1960 and was held quadrennially thereafter. It was in these races that Francis Chichester (later Sir Francis Chichester (Chichester, Sir Francis), q.v.) attracted attention. Interest in sailing around the world was greatly stimulated by his lone voyage around the world in 1966–67. Circumnavigation races included the Golden Globe Race, sponsored by the Sunday Times of London in 1968, and races later organized by the Royal Naval Racing Association and held quadrennially from 1973. The introduction of self-steering gear did much to facilitate such racing.

* * *