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“The First…” Well, Hold On… Was it Really the First? Part 1

Story by Clay Thompson, Photos by Forrest Bryant, Heartland Classics Chapter We all seem to love to document things, the highest, the cheapest, the best, the biggest, most expensive, and even who did it first! I think we all just adore the guy who thought of it first, So for today, let’s entertain ourselves with some firsts, and…

Member Profile: Rocky Mountain Classics Members, Russ and Dena Murray

Russ’s love affair with mahogany boats began as a boy living on Lake George in the Adirondack Mountains of northern New York. It was the 1950s, and wood was about the only available option for boats.  Years later, Russ set out to find a classic “woody” boat like the ones he’d grown up with and,…

ABM Collection Highlight: Country Music Star Alan Jackson’s Flat Top

As Alan Jackson closes his final tour, here is a highlight of a boat once owned by the country music superstar. Donated by Jackson to the Antique Boat Museum, it is now part of the museum’s in-water fleet and enjoyed by visitors as a fantastic piece of history. The Chris-Craft Semi-Enclosed Cruiser models from the…

Millie

By Joe Roberts, Northern California/Lake Tahoe Chapter Millie or as she was known as for the first 55 plus years of her life, as just the unnamed family Chris-Craft was the family boat. My father-in-law Ray bought her new in 1958, so the family could have a boat when they were at their lake cabin…

Classic Technologies Influence Modern Military Boat Design

When an autonomous Navy boat rescued two downed Army helicopter pilots in the Straits of Hormuz in June 2026, it was interesting to note the technologies enabling the rescue directly trace back to classic boats.  The boat, nicknamed the Corsair, is fully autonomous, 24-feet, with a maximum speed of 35 knots, that can travel 1,000…

The Green Hornet

By Ted Lyman, Northern California/Lake Tahoe Chapter Green Hornet is our second Philbrick; the first, Born Again, was restored by my father and me in 1980 — the year we joined ACBS. It was during the follow-up restoration of Born Again in Don Philbrick’s Oakland shop in 1990 that Green Hornet fell into our ownership.…

Hollywood Calling!

Award Winning Fatal Attraction Featured in Hollywood Productions By Bob Newcomer, SoCal Chapter In November 2009, I attended a workshop at Robinson Restorations in Fallbrook, California, when Tim Robinson called me aside and showed me a loose-leaf notebook that had details of a boat for sale. Tim knew I was looking for this exact model…

Sail 250 Casts Off in Yorktown, Virginia

What a weekend it was in Yorktown, VA, when Sail 250 tacked and jibed into port on the York River as part of the America 250 celebration. Yorktown, the site of Cornwallis’s surrender and the beginning of the end of the Revolutionary War, was just one of many backdrops across Virginia that celebrated both naval…

The History of John Trumpy & Sons, Inc., Part 2

Frizzy Atwell was in charge of all new yacht construction at Trumpy’s. Jim Emmeric headed the plumbing shop, Frank Thomas, the joiner shop, Rob Childs, the electrical shop, Ed Norton, the mill shop, Frank Wagner, the carpenter shop and Bunky Durham, the boat building shop. The division of labor was well defined at the Trumpy…