From James Barrick, Wine Country Chapter
Oliver Outboards:
In 1953, the Chris-Craft Boat Company closed their kicker division and sold out to the Oliver Tractor and Farm Equipment Company. Oliver replaced the Chris- Craft 5 1/2 hp Challenger with a completely modernized 5 1/2 outboard of their own. Some were painted in rich blues as shown here. They were also known as the J Challenger.
Mercury Outboards:
One of Mercury’s famous trolling motors of the 50s was the Mark 5. Mercury ran exciting ads reading:
Trolls all day at a crawl
Had plenty of power for a fast run.
Mercury engineering gives you tomorrow’s outboard today.
Truly weedless operation.
Mercury full jeweled power too!
Scott Atwater Outboards:
This is the 5hp bail-o-matic from 1953. Scott Atwater tooled up to offer a new series of green (bottom shroud) and gold (top cover section) outboards. Not only did they offer new coloring, but Scott Atwater also aimed at giving boaters a new nautical feature in marine history: a mechanical bailer. A vacuum pump that pulls water through the bail-o-matic device then shoots it out of the boat at 150 gph maximum. This water did not circulate through the engine cooling system.
Scott Atwater Auto-bail
Cotter Pins…readily available on the Scott Atwater.
These outboard motors are from the James Barrick Outboard Motor Collection.
My first outboard was a 1 1/2 hp Neptune. I spent many. many hours in my 14′ boat that my dad & I made from scratch, cruising the canals and back waterways in South Miami frequent back into the ‘Glades (Everglades) on camping trips. My dad asked me what color did I want to paint it and I looked around the garage and saw an old can of silver paint. “Silver I said.” So, I worked really hard painting it perfectly. On my next trip a week or so later as I was refilling the gas tank and spilled a little on the floor. Then, I realized my mistake, silver paint is dissolved by gaoline. In no time my bare feet, hands, face, and everywhere else had silver splotches. What a mess! I used my shirt and what ever else I had to clean up and continued on. When I returned, my dad almost didn’t recognize me. I looked like some kind on an alien. We eventually encapsulated the silver with a good coat of varnish which fixed the problem (mostly.)
Beautiful industrial art James! Thanks for sharing!!
Does anyone know of a Martin outboard repair location?
I have a complete 7-1/2 hp motor and a parts motor that I’d like to get running.