by Dick & Cara Moist members of the Heartland Classics chapter My wife Cara and I bought our first cruiser Fifty one years ago. It was a 25′ Owen’s cruiser. We had it for just one year, but with a 3 year old and another on the way 25′ was just a little tight. Cara’s…
by Joe & Patti Silipigno members of the Adirondack chapter We purchased the Boathouse as our summer home in 1997 which entailed a major renovation from top to bottom. It was in the year 2000, upon retirement, that we decided to turn our home into the Boathouse Bed and Breakfast. We had always envisioned a…
by Kenneth Ryker member of the Sunnyland chapter I have been racing r/c boats and my favorite boat has been my 30 inch electric Shovel nose hydroplane that is called the Miss K. The hull was designed from Ed Karelson’s and I like the way this boat handled the water. I decided the boat was…
by Stephen Ogilvy member of the New England chapter I have owned this 1967 Lyman Hardtop Cruisette Blue Lady since the fall of 2013, purchased in Vermilion, OH. This is the second wooden boat I have purchased from this area of Ohio. Previously I had bought an 18′ 1955 Chris Craft Sea Skiff in Port…
by Dennis & Donna Friesel members of the Indiana chapter Between 1990 and 1996, I restored a very broken 19’1953 Chris-Craft Racing Runabout that my wife named Mahogamous Affair. This was my first effort at restoring an antique boat and we still use it today. By this time my wife and I were confirmed boaters…
by Seb Borrello member of the Thousand Islands chapter When we saw the Penn Yan Cartopper in front of a small cottage on a back road near Clayton NY, we screeched to a stop. Sure enough it had a For Sale sign on it. No trailer and no oars but a good-looking hull with all…
by Vic Melchiorre member of the Indiana chapter I saw my Chris-Craft XK18 several years before I bought it. One summer day in 2011 or 2012, my best friend Brian Buehrer and I decided to go to Cassopolis, Michigan from Lake James Indiana to see Roger Pecina’s museum & collection of boats & etc. We…
by Lance Ehrke member of the Glacier Lakes chapter Our Chris-Craft is a 1933 18′ Deluxe Runabout. She was built in late 1933 and delivered in early 1934 to Green Lake, Wisconsin. Her serial number is 33013 and as an early model of the family of 208 runabouts that were built over the next 5…
by Dix Wolcott member of Thousand Islands chapter Our 1948 Century Sea Maid Bebop was awarded Outstanding Restored Classic Runabout at the 2015 Annual Antique Boat Museum Show in Clayton. The week before, the Sea Maid was awarded Best in Show – Restored at the 2015 ACBS-New England Chapter Show in Meredith, NH. Bebop had…
by Kevin Maltby member of Glacier Lakes chapter Aragonne is a 1938 Chris Craft 17’deluxe Model 818 with the KB 121hp engine. There were 23 model 818’s made in 1938 and Aragonne was the last one built in July of 1938. She was sent to Madison Wisconsin on July 11, 1938 and was used on…
by Jim McGrath member of Inland Empire & Big Sky chapters In the much-fabled “summer of 69” and at 14 years old, I first saw her and fell in love. It was in a neighbor’s barn near our family’s summer home on Swan Lake in northwest Montana. She was beautiful, stunning, and a lot older…
by Brian Ferrin member of the Northern California/Lake Tahoe chapter I wasn’t looking for another boat, much less a 1982 Ski Nautique. I’d had 7 tournament ski boats, including 6 Nautiques but when I saw it sitting on its trailer on the dealer’s lot in Rocklin, Ca I was curious. The salesman told me that…