By Kevin Bamerick, ACBS Member and Regular ACBS Rudder Contributor E. Murray Lombard wrote entertaining epithets of boat names in the 1929 Motor Boating magazine. The “999 sounds fast,” he wrote, “999 was a super hydro.” The hydro-plane was owned by Edsel Bryant Ford of Detroit, Michigan. Resemblant to Horace Dodge’s Baby Delphine, John Hacker, in…
By Graeme Hoatson Beattie, Manotick Chapter William L. Ralph was the adopted son of Michael Ralph. Little is known about Michael, yet he did have the financial means and wherewithal to acquire a 99-year lease from the Canadian Crown to establish Ralph Island in 1889. Ralph Island is a mile away from Portland near the…
By Rob Wilkinson, Pacific Northwest Chapter Photos by Colleen Chartier Several decades ago, while sitting on the banks of the Montlake Cut near the University of Washington where the Boys in the Boat practiced and raced in the 1930s, my friend Elizabeth and I spotted a beautiful mahogany speedboat cruising through the canal. We swooned.…
By Amy Scanlin Slow down. Disconnect. Unplug. There is art in nature for those willing to take a look – clouds reflecting on a mountain lake, the gentle curve of a polished gunwale, a new day dawning as oars pull through the water, leaving ripples, like fingerprints, fading into the the shoreline. The breath slows…
By Neil Hoehle, Heartland Chapter Growing up in the tiny town of Wapello, Iowa, with the Mississippi River at our doorstep, I started boating with my parents before I could walk. My parents owned a variety of boats through the late 1950’s and early 60’s, but always seemed to be searching for that one boat…
Lessons Learned from the Restoration of Inlet Belle By Ian Devlin, Western Canadian Antique and Classic Boat Society Oftentimes retirement continues to be as big a learning opportunity as the working years. This has certainly been true in my case, particularly since taking on and restoring a “gray hull.” Inlet Belle’s hull was stored out…
By Don Gulliksen, Lake Hopatcong Chapter Our Chris Craft was built in 1931, now over 90 years ago. We don’t know how many owners she has had or how many adventures she has been a part of. She lived through the Great Depression and World War II. She even survived the boat industry shift to…
By Steve and Denise McCune, Southwest Chapter This story is of course about boating, but it is also about how others helped us to realize our life-long dream to one day own a yacht class boat. A great man once said, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people…
By Gilbert Vacheret, France Chapter I’m happy to present to you my Pedrazzini boat, she is an European classic boat with lots of American boat character traits. In the beginning in 1906, Augusto Pedrazzini emigrated from Italy to the shores of Lake Zurich where he started his nautical experience. Even though this brand is a…
By Janice Miller, Finger Lakes Chapter Member As I write this piece, looking at the snow-covered pines outside my window with a glimpse of the clear blue lake in the background, summer and boating weather in Upstate New York, seem a long way off. I live and work in the beautiful Finger Lakes region where…
The Boss 1921 Day Express Cruiser The Boss is a 42-foot Day Express Cruiser built in 1921 by the Great Lakes Boat Building Corporation of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Great Lakes Boat Building Corporation built custom luxury wooden yachts in Milwaukee from 1916 until moving to the Chicago River in 1926 where it continued operations until…
By David Kanally, Southwest Chapter Member, with Bill Mott, Southwest Chapter Member and Event Volunteer Bill Mott likes boats. Big cruisers and Chris-Craft runabouts are part of his family history. He can drive just about anything that floats. So, when it comes time for the sea trials of the boats we restore in the Wooden…