Long Beach "Worlds" - 1950

In July, 1950, the Californians hosted a "Worlds" at Long Beach, though technically we would consider it a North Americans since the attendees were all Americans, with the exception of the two Canadians making up the foreign contingent. This was the third of three consecutive years of major North American regattas, the previous two being; 1948 in Rochester N.Y., and 1949 in Montreal, Canada. These regattas would solidify the post WWII International 14 presence in North America, with strong fleets developing on both coasts and Canada (though, ironically, by 1950, the original Rochester Y.C. fleet was struggling and would not remain a viable fleet for too much longer).

The regatta would feature two series; a three race One-Design series, since the California fleet was now a one-design around the Douglass and McLeod hot-molded Alarm shape, and a three race Open Fleet series, which accommodated the development International 14 of the Canadians. (and the East Coast was moving toward an Open Fleet as well.) The USOD 14's raced in the Open Fleet (they were still International 14's) but it is unclear what the Canadians did while the One-Design series was held.

Bill Lapworth was the overall winner when the results of both series were added together (getting his name on the Founders Trophy) but Dick Stephens of Stockton would win the Open Fleet series. I was able to get the results of the Open Series off the Web which I post below (the hull numbers I have added as best I can).

To view this file, click on the pop-out icon on the top right of the window. This will put it on another tab on your browser.



I have posted this photo before on the CBIFDA blog and which I can now identify as taken at the 1950 Long Beach "Worlds" regatta.

Summer of 2015 Update

I haven't posted for a while (actually, it pains me to say, this is the first post in 2015) though Classic International 14 news keeps filtering through at a steady pace.

Out in the Pacific Northwest, Mike Scott has put a smaller 120 square foot rig on his Ames II Obsession. He sent along a video of him and a crew bombing along but I'm awaiting a YouTube link so I can embed it. He reports he is very pleased with the performance of the smaller rig. Mike also picked up a Schock Fairey model International 14 which was lying just up the road from his house. I am awaiting photos of both Classic 14's on the water together.

Mike with Obsession on the beach at some small craft get together.

In March, Jay Hartley of Connecticut sent along some photos of a beautiful restoration he did on USOD no. 282. He also finds that a Classic International 14 has loads of sail. His story on the rebuild:

"Thanks for getting back to me, It was in bad shape then but I traded a 125 Yamaha dirt bike for it about 5 years ago. I live in amston CT but keep the boat in Marlborough. Took me 3 years of on and off work to get it back in the water. When I first got it I took it out on a lake and the lead weight on the center board fell off and almost put a fast end to a nice boat. At that point it came out and got a nice makeover. Do you think the 24'mast is original? It seams to have way to much sail for a 14' dingy and can get a little crazy in winds over 15 mph. Could easily hold two crew on trapies to try and counter the heeling it seams.

P.S. took a week of free diving in 20' of water to find the weight. Learned a hard lesson that time."

Catching up - another US One-Design surfaces

This blog has been dormant for most of the summer. It happens.

I have been receiving some emails and here is one I would like to share (look at the post following this one for a Douglas and McCleod 14 that is up for sale).

Allan Pickman of New Hampshire has picked up a Douglas and McLeod Int. 14 and has posted on the Woodenboat forum about his find. The hull looks very restorable. Unfortunately he is thinking of putting a rig other than the normal International 14 rig into her.

From a photo I lifted from the Woodenboat forum.

U.S. One-Design # 269

I had just got off the phone with George Moffat, who had modified and raced USOD US 268 in the mid 1950's, when I turned back to the computer and found an email about the next 14 in the number sequence, USOD US 269, built by Pat Curtiss in Erie Pennsylvania, in 1947.

From Pat's email:

"Here are a couple of photographs of US 269 which a friend and I built in high school from a Douglass and McLeod kit in 1947 in Erie, PA . The kit came with the centerboard case installed, so the difficult carpentry was done. We did all the rest . It was quite a surprise to the local small boat sailors to see the impressive performance of this boat. We sold the boat in 1952 and I don't know its fate.

By the way, the picture on Mar 2 of the interior is not a Douglass and McLeod model which was very similar to the Thistle, with a number of lateral slats forward near the mast step, and a number of lateral slats aft near the transom. There were two flotation tanks, one forward of the mast and the other just forward of the transom.

US312 was also in Erie PA in 1948 but we were never able to get a larger class going. We did race the boat at Put-in-Bay, OH a number of times."

Interesting about Pat's comments on the standard interior layout of the Douglass and McLeod One-Design. I do know that finishing off the shells, as Pat and his friend did, was a common way to get into the International 14 class in the 1940's and 1950's, and with all the amateur completions, there may be a wide variety of interiors. The interior layout I featured in a previous post as being of a One-Design was typical of the Uffa 14's being built in the late 1930's and was carried over to the early Fairey Marine 14's in the late 1940's. Come to think of it, the photo in that previous post may be a early Fairey Marine 14 and not a US One-Design. Oops! (After some thought, I've corrected that previous post.)

The two pictures, Pat sent along:

USOD # 370 Re-emerges - Slightly worn but restorable

Yarrow Thorne from Providence R.I. emails:

"I just picked up hull 370 today and hope to have the boat ready for display at the worlds in Toronto 2013........ I am looking forward to bringing back a classic."

From the pics, looks like USOD # 370 has spent a lot of time propped up on the starboard gunwhale, a long enough time that gunwhale is completely gone and the veneer on the sheer has deteriorated. Also, the interior seems to have disappeared; the thwart looks to be a modern afterthought. It's obvious Yarrow is starting from a basic shell, but, all in all, looks like a good project.

USOD # 360 Sails Again

Paul and Yvonne Galvez got their newly purchased USOD # 360 on the water last weekend (not sure where in Southern California it was, but there are some spectacular cliffs in the background). Paul's email was bubbling over with enthusiasm at sailing this newly rediscovered gem:

"Finally had a chance to put the old girl through her paces... I'm impressed. The boat is lively and very responsive. Even though she is tame by today's standards, it is still an athletic boat and demands precise trim for optimum speed and height. Believe it or not, the sails are original Ratsey and Lapthorne from '47. They are a bit blown out compared to what I am used to but in extraordinary shape nonetheless, with very little wear. This boat does not have any weight in the centerboard. No jib sheet cleats either. We got it planing in about 15 knots true and relatively flat seas. The vang exploded on a power reach but everything else held up fine.

She is getting a makeover now and will be beefed up at the mast partner, bulkheads,  dagger board trunk, and of course the vang. We do not want anymore explosions... Plans are to also replace the hiking straps and buoyancy tanks, along with some aesthetics. She should hopefully be ready to go by Summer. There is already talk of shipping her to Toronto for a vintage regatta that may take place during the 14 Worlds next year. Stay tuned."

And the pics of USOD #360 bombing along, spray flying after spending decades in a garage:

US One-Design Classic International 14 (Part 2)

Southern California becomes the center of the USOD class

Somewhere in the late 1940's the nexus of U.S One-Design International 14 fleet activity (the one-design now switched from the R.I.P. design to the Douglass and McLeod hot molded Uffa Fox Alarm hull shape) moved from the Rochester fleet to the Southern Californian fleet. And as one dynamic mover-and-shaker exited (the founder of the US International 14 class, George Ford of Rochester, retired from 14's and started another successful yachting career on the Great Lakes in a Sparkman and Stephens designed yawl), another one emerged, a Southern Californian, Dick Fenton, the Commodore of Balboa Yacht Club, Commodore of Southern California Yachting Association, and by 1948, president of the nascent U.S. International Fourteen Association.

Details of the rise of the Southern Californian USOD fleet are somewhat sketchy; it would be best to first go back and reread the excellent early Southern California history as put down by Peter Gales. It is at the 1948 "International Championship Regatta", hosted by George Ford and the Rochester Yacht Club, that the Southern Californians demonstrated how strong a one-design International 14 fleet they had organized in three short years. Six Californian 14 teams made the cross-country trip out east and they left with the majority of the prizes.

What do we know about the USOD from the  1948 "International Championship Regatta"?

1. A one-design rule had already been hammered out by 1948, as the regatta was split into two series; a three race series for the US One-Designs and a three race series for the "Open" International 14 (the Canadians were having none of this one-design; led by Charlie Bourke, they were happily developing new designs - also being hot molded). The USOD fleet met the requirements for the 'Open" rule (the English 14 development rule) and sailed  for the "Open" series trophies as well.
2. The one-design rule allowed lighter 14's than the open rule as some of the USOD's had to carry correctors to meet the 225 lb. hull weight minimum when racing in the "Open" rule.
3. In the light air to drifter series, the 1935 Alarm hull of the USOD would prove as fast as anything designed up to that point; five of the USOD's scoring better in the "Open" series than Charlie Bourke's 1944 'Conneda". (This was nothing out-of-the-ordinary as, much later, a re-rigged USOD would win a light air regatta in the 1970's against the latest Kirbys and Proctors.)
4. Obviously Douglass and McLeod was selling the USOD, either as a hull or a complete 14, to anyone who wanted to front the money. Since the USOD was the only 14 game in town for the United States in the late 1940's, the Douglass and McLeod USOD filtered into the East Coast - besides the fleet in Rochester there was a small fleet in Essex Ct -,  though the majority of boats were going west to the burgeoning fleet in Southern California. The East Coast, like the Canadians, would never buy into the one-design rule, but (and this is where the confusion comes from) the Douglass and McLeod Alarm hulls would always be referred to as the U.S. One Design (USOD), or One-Design for short, even though, on the East Coast, they would never be raced as a one-design.

Below is the somewhat famous photo of the kingpin of the early Southern Californian USOD fleet, Dick Fenton, in his Douglass and McLeod number 116 (note the caret symbol under the 14 insignia - designating this 14 as a one-design), sailing with a reef in the main.

(To be continued.)

U.S. One-Design Classic International 14 (Part 1)

U.S. One-Design International 14 - Pre-WW II and immediate Post-WW II

There is considerable confusion when I write about the U.S. One Design International 14 (this being the most common Classic International 14 hull being found for restoration). The International 14 has always been considered a development class. but there was a period before WW II, and the decade after WW II,  that major areas of U.S. 14 activity were sailing the 14's as a one-design, with their own rules. (As an aside, U.S. International 14 history is peppered with one-design classes that come directly from the International 14, such as the Jet 14, the Gannet dinghy and, more recently (1990's), another class called the One Design 14, based on the Jay Cross Mk 3 hull, built and marketed by Peter Johnstone.)

The history of the U.S. One-Design International 14 class starts pre WW II, in 1936, right at the beginning, when the founder of the U.S. International 14 class, George Ford, had local boatbuilders producing ribbed copies of the Uffa Fox "R.I.P" design in and around Rochester, New York. George Ford noted the success of American one-design classes of that period (the Snipe, Lightning, Comet, Star) and reasoned it would be better to get this new International 14 class, based on the English rules, off the ground in the U.S. as a one-design hull. George Ford's desire to mass produce a one-design 14 was immediately hamstrung by (in copying from Uffa Fox), the very complicated method of building these "R.I.P" hulls (double planked, about 80+ steamed ribs, thousands of copper rivets). George never quite solved the problem of meeting three criteria at the same time; how to build a "R.I.P." 14 down to weight, strong enough and, given the labor intensive construction, how to build them at a profit. It's hard to determine how many of these R.I.P copies were built (20, maybe 30). In 1938, the Rochester group ran into Sandy Douglass from Ohio at a Put-In-Bay regatta and shortly after that, Sandy Douglass started building ribbed 14's to a more modern and faster hull design than "R.I.P", that of Uffa Fox's later "Alarm" design ('R.I.P" being designed by Uffa in 1931, "Alarm" being designed in 1935). How many ribbed "Alarm's" Sandy Douglass built is unknown. (I've seen the total number of U.S. ribbed 14's built, both "R.I.P" and "Alarm" hulls pegged at 37, but this may be conjecture).

After WWII, around 1945, Sandy Douglass, now in partnership with Ray McLeod Sr, started producing both his famous Thistle sailing dinghy and the "Alarm" design International 14's using the hot molding ply veneer process developed during WW II. (The hull shells were molded by U.S. Molded Shapes in Grand Rapids Michigan - formerly U.S. Plywood - and then trucked back to Vermillion Ohio for completion.) Given the ability to mass produce hot molded ply hulls, the hull of choice for a One-Design International 14 now switched over to the Uffa Fox "Alarm" design. The Rochester fleet, already solidly pro one-design, was now to be joined by another fleet as one-design proponents; the new, upstart International 14 fleet in Southern California. (to be continued.)

Davidson Ski Company; More Information Needed

When I went digging into this North American International 14 history, I thought that only Douglass and McLeod built the hot-molded Uffa Alarm hull. I did have a couple of measurement certificates from the Seattle fleet that listed "Davidson" as a builder of the "One-Design" (Alarm shapes), but I assumed that this was probably a boat builder that was finishing off molded hulls supplied by Douglass and McLeod.

It appears that I have been wrong, as there was a Davidson Ski Company that morphed into the Davidson Manufacturing Company in Vancouver, British Columbia, and it appears they were hot-molding canoes, small sailboats and also, from my records, their own version of the Alarm International 14.

I haven't a confirmation of this, but everything points to this. I came across Phillip Merchant who posted this history on a wooden canoe forum:

"I have been doing some research on the Davidson company(s) and this is the first that I have heard of them building canoes. It does not surprise me however, as they seemed to have had many interests over the years. What I have so far is that Hamish Davidson was a cabinet maker and early on developed an interest in building skis. He built wooden skis (and I'm sure many other things) through the late 1920's and into the 1940's. There is a pair of wooden skis in a museum in Quebec circa 1940 built by him. There is also a reference to him building some of the first fiberglass skis. 

In the 1940's Davidson and Charles Hourston worked for Boeing together building the Mosquito bombers. In 1948 Davidson (with Charles Hourston) started building small boats of wood and later fiberglass. There seems to be several different companies under variations of the name Davidson."

Davidson had experience with the hot-molded wood manufacturing in building the Mosquito bombers, there exists hot molded 12 foot and 17 foot Davidson daysailors, and I have measurement certificates for Davidson built US One-Design (Alarm) International 14's - the only proper conclusion is that we have another builder of the US One-Design hot-molded hulls.

Internet research and inquiries on Davidson Manufacturing have not yielded anything in response. Hence, if you are reading this and have more information, leave a comment or track down my email address in my "About Me" section.

US 408

Another D&M One-Design has been located, this one in Ithaca NY. Owned by John Greenly, he bought it in 1971 from the West Coast. He has replaced the wooden mast with a cut down 505 mast and added some buoyancy. I have this 14 being owned by R.J. Savage of Corona del Mar, California in 1958.

Hopefully, down the road, he will send some pics.

Pictures from the Peter Gale article

Here are two pictures that accompanied the Peter Gale article about the history of the International 14 in Southern California (again from the May 1992 issue of Planing On). Both pictures are of the molded-plywood, One-Design 'Alarm' shape. Pictures from the 1950's. (Again, click inside the picture to start a slideshow.)

Southern Californian One-Designs off the Long Beach waterfront.

I'm not sure if Sue Ficker is - or is not - related to Bill Ficker, skipper of Intrepid in the 1970's America's Cup.

From Carbon, Back to Hot Molded Wood

2011 U.S National Champ, Paul Galvez, (in the modern hi-tech International 14's) shot an email over to "Old 14er Central" about his surprising latest International 14 purchase.

"We just recently purchased a Douglas One Design, USA 360 built in '49. It's in surprisingly good shape and we intend to complete a restoration of her true to her era. If you have any info about this particular boat, please let me know. Any info about the Douglas One Design including photos of rigging and deck layout would be much appreciated. We are also consulting with our west coast elders for any info to make sure the restoration is accurate."

 Paul didn't detail who the "We" was in the team behind this purchase. I checked the records and US 360 isn't listed. The date of 1949 looks correct though (I have records on US 332 and US 390 as both being built in 1949). It does look like there is, on the West Coast, a considerable amount of restoration on International 14's that were built just post WW II. Perhaps a vintage gathering down the road?

Paul, two wire blasting in his modern International 14.................

US 360.... looks from the photo that Paul picked up a complete vintage 14 thats ready to go......

Two Pictures; US 116 and Sailing in Annapolis Harbor

Two pictures (click inside any picture for slideshow); The first picture Mark Woodard found on the Internet. US 116 is presumed to be a hot molded Sandy Douglass/Uffa Fox Alarm hull.

A picture in Annapolis Harbor. Looks to be frostbite sailing back when there were no drysuits or wetsuits. Skipper and crew unknown. Hull design unknown. Looks to be in the early 1960's.

Note from Steven Smith about Douglas and McLeod Int. 14's

Received this note from Steven Smith of California, who is looking for a Douglas and McLeod International 14 to restore.

"I've been trying to research the Fourteens of the 1940's and 1950's, those my Dad refers to as the Douglass one-design 14. I would just love to find one of Douglass' molded plywood 14's to restore and sail.

I grew up sailing the Thistle, crewing with my Dad starting at age 8. I sailed with him until I finished college and my sister took over my spot on the boat. We did plenty of restoration work on the old woodie Thistle, of course also built by D&M, including new rails and re-fitting the centerboard trunk. Its still one of the fastest Thistles around. Now at age 54, I find myself back in the middle spot on the Thistle again. I love the way the boat sails, but for my own boat, I can't muster a crew of 3, and the Thistle is just a tad too big and heavy to fit in my side yard.

So, my mind wanders to how wonderful it would be to have one of the old molded plywood 14's, perfect for me and my wife in light to medium air, and with a big friend in heavier wind. In a perfect world there would be enough of these beautiful old boats around to race each other, but I would be content with just the delight of an afternoon sail. Actually, I suspect the local Thistle fleet would be happy to have me race with them.

As I understand, D&M made 175 molded-hull 14's (?). They are no doubt mostly rotting under canvas tarps in barns -what a shame. I'll bring one back to life if I can find one. Do you have any ideas at all on where one could be found? How to even look? The current class seems so far removed from those boats that they hardly seem aware of them, and certainly don't appreciate them. What they call a 'classic' is still a modern fire-breathing beast compared to the non-trapeze boats. The vintage wood boat movement in the UK seems to do better, but of course they would not
have any of Douglass' boats.

Also, there is a book from England that is referenced but I can't find a hard copy, T.J. Vaughan's "History of the Fourteens, 1923-2003" or something like that. Any chance you might know where or how to get a copy of the book? The text is online, but apparently the book has pictures, drawings, figures.

I'm on the west coast, San Jose, CA. but I wouldn't mind traveling east if I needed to find a boat. Anyone local in the west you know of with a classic that I could meet and chat with?

Any help or suggestions you may have would be appreciated."

If you can help Steve, leave a comment to this post, or email me at the address found over in the "About Me" section

US390; For sale

A Douglas and McLeod Uffa Fox One Design. Built 1949. Owned by Jim Gallagher of Vermont. Up for sale on Craigslist.