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Sail Number:

Vessel Type: Staysail Schooner

LOA: 105′ 0″ / 32m – LOD: 91’8″ / 28m – LWL: 65′ 7″ / 20m – Beam 19′ 7″ / 6m – Draft 13′ 1″ / 4m – Hull: Steel – Displacement: 84 tons – Hull Number: 891 – Sail Area: 4,154sqft / 386msq – Designer: N.G. Herreshoff – Built By: Herreshoff Manufacturing Co., Bristol, R.I. – Contract Date: 12/13/1922
Original Price: $ 76,000 – Former name(s) ex, Wildfire – Boat Location: Santos, Brasil
Flag: Brazil (BR)

 

Historical:

Launched in 1923 as WILDFIRE was one of the last yachts built by the Herreshoff Manufacturing Co, of which was sold a year after her commissioning.

In 2002, saving her from the scrap mills, Gilberto Miranda, purchased her and she underwent a full refit and build at the MCP Yachts Shipyard.

 

Provenance (The Wall of Remembrance – The Owners, Crew & Notable Guest):

Owner/Guardian: (1922-1950) – Charles L. Harding – New York Yacht Club Commodore
Owner/Guardian: (1950-1957) – Jorge Bhering de Matos – Rio de Janeiro
Owner/Guardian: (1957-2002) – Dircea Fortouta
Owner/Guardian: (2002-XXXX) – Gilberto Miranda

 

 

Sail Number: A

Vessel Type: Fractional Sloop

LOA: 30′ 6″ / 9.29m – LOD: 30′ 6″ / 9.29m – LWL: 21′ 6″ / 6.55m – Beam: 6′ 6″ / 1.98m – Draft: 4’9″ / 1.45m – Displacement: 4,559 lbs / 2067.92kg Ballast: 2,835 lbs. / 1285.93kg – Sail Area: 377 sq ft – Design Number: – Yard Number: – Rig: Fractional Sloop – Designer: W. Starling Burgess – Built by: Abeking & Rasmussin, Lemwerder, Germany – Original Owner: – Year Built: 1929 – Website: The Atlantic Class

 

Historical:

The Atlantic Class – In the summer of 1928, W. Starling Burgess, who would later design Ranger and two other J Boats that defended the America’s Cup, sailed from yacht club to yacht club on Long Island Sound in a 30-foot prototype sloop he called the Atlantic Coast One Design. Burgess’ creation was intended to promote a class of fast boats that were identical for racing and could be daysailed as well. Eighty orders for the boat were taken that first summer, and the wooden hulls were built in production-line style at the German shipbuilding firm of Abeking and Rasmussen.

In March, 1929, the new owners gathered excitedly at New York’s Harvard Club to formalize a class association. They voted to change the name of the boat from “Atlantic Coast One Design” to, simply, “Atlantic”. Pequot YC in Southport, CT, whose members had purchased the first 20 Atlantics, offered to hold the first national championship that summer, and there was even a report that Cuba was planning to order four boats and hold a midwinter championship the next year. The class was off!

The new boats, shipped to the United States on the decks of freighters, had been very well built, and the first summer of racing was a success. Remarked Everett B. Morris, the noted columnist of the New York Herald Tribune, “Theoretically, the Atlantics are planked with mahogany on oak ribs, but the more active these boats become, the stronger grows the belief that they are constructed of rubber.” Twenty more boats were ordered that fall, and the Class’s first generation was built to its goal of 100 boats by the summer of 1930.

Atlantic racing flourished during the Thirties and Forties with the participation of such distinguished sailors as Bob Bavier, Clifford Mallory, David Noyes, Bus and Bob Mosbacher, Corny Shields, George Hinman and Briggs Cunningham. But by the early Fifties, the boats were beginning to show their age. Fifteen of the original hundred had been lost in storms, and many of the rest required a good deal of bailing while racing. Something had to be done.

At the 25th annual Atlantic meeting in the fall of 1953, 12-Meter skipper Cunningham offered to put up $5,000 to help the class build a mold and a demonstration fiberglass boat. The Cape Cod Shipbuilding Company used Rumour, No. 27, to make a plug and attached the original keel, rudder, spars and hardware to a new fiberglass hull. Author John Hersey bought the revamped Rumour and raced her during the 1954 season to see how she compared with the wooden boats. The class wanted to be sure that the older boats would remain competitive. Hersey later wrote, “With her hull so close to the original design, the glass boat sails well in all weather…she takes chop in a seaway particularly well, without pounding, seeming to put a shoulder in and push through.” The second generation of Atlantics was born, and the class became one of the first to convert to glass.

During all this time, no new Atlantics were built. The rumor mill had it that the design plans were destroyed when Abeking and Rasmussen was bombed during World War II.

It wasn’t until 1962 that a boat with a sail number greater than 100 finally appeared. No. 101 was the first of a third generation of Atlantics that came out of a new mold that included the keel. Nearly 50 new boats have been built in the years since then, and the class has adopted a number of modifications to keep the boat modern and competitive. A new spinnaker design, with higher shoulders and greater area, appeared in 1965; aluminum spars were permitted in 1969; the jib became a deck-sweeper in 1973; in 1984 adjustable backstays were allowed. Each change has been made with careful attention to the strict one-design principles that have characterized the class since its inception.

 

Provenance (The Wall of Remembrance – The Owners, Crew & Notable Guest):

Owner:

 

 

Sail Number:

Type: Schooner

LOA: 203’0” / 62.00m – LWL: 132’0” / 40.18m – Beam: 36’0” / 10.88m – Draft: max 26’0” / 8.02m min 12’0” / 3.64m – Designer: Hoek Design Naval Architects – Original Name: ATHOS – Original Owner: Private – Year Built: 2010 -Built by: Holland Jachtbouw – Hull material: Alcan Sealium Aluminium – Sail Area: upwind 5,784 ft2 – Spinnaker: 4303 ft2 / 1312m2 – Displacement: 370 tonnes – Engine: 2 x Volvo D16C-A MH EVC (479 kW / 651 hp) – Flag: United Kingdom (GB) – Location: Marine Traffic

 

Historical:

Athos is one of the most spectacular and innovative sailing yachts to be launched in recent years.

She is the world’s largest privately-owned two-masted schooner and the most technologically sophisticated classic sailing yacht to date.

Athos is the result of the combined efforts of award-winning designer Andre Hoek, renowned Dutch builder Holland Jachtbouw and the yacht’s own highly committed owner who personally oversaw a raft of engineering innovations being introduced to the project.

Zijlmans Jachtbouw – “In 2005 I took him to see the 55m ketch Adèle and he loved the twin deckhouse owner’s privacy concept that Hoek Design pioneered on this yacht. Initially, he felt that Adèle was a little too large for his requirements, which seems ironic now when you consider how the project grew from 44m to 58m by the time HJB joined the team in 2006. As we developed Athos, more space was added for the crew, guests and equipment.”

“The initial brief for a 90kW bowthruster was superseded by a request for a more powerful bowthruster,’ remembers Zijlmans. ‘The amount of power [150kW] was unprecedented and when it became clear that he would have to finance some serious development work, the owner decided to commission a sternthruster at the same time with the same power.”

“Moreover, both thrusters had to be able to be operated simultaneously with both main engines running on a fixed rpm of just 1,500 because he also wanted to have the option to run the complete installation in combination with gearbox-driven generators. This was quite a puzzle to work out and required well over 2,000 engineering hours.”

“By this time, we had prepared a hull construction and layout for a system one fifth of the size so we had to rethink the proposed design, working everything around the entire installation to keep it all concealed,’ says Zijlmans. ‘The pumps on the main engines and generators are huge and the piping needed to transfer and hold the pressure involved in such a vast system power is tremendous.”

 

 

 

Provenance (The Wall of Remembrance – The Owners, Crew & Notable Guest):

• Owner/Guardian: (2010) Private
• Owner/Guardian:

 

 

Resources

Yacht ATHOS
Zijlmans Jachtbouw

 

Sail Number: K36

Type: International 8 Metre

LOA: 46′ 10″ / 14.26m – LOD: 46′ 10″ / 14.26m – LWL: 30′ 0″ / 9.13m – Beam: 8′ 7″ / 2.60m – Draft: 6″ 5″ / 1.96m – Displacement: 8.65 Tonnes – Hull material: Carvel mahogany on part composite frame – Designer: William Fife III – Built by: Holms Båtvarv, Gamleby – Year Built: 1939 – Original Name: ILDERIM – Original Owner: Marcus Wallenberg, Jr, Swedish banker – Current Name: ATHENA – Current Owner: Jonathan Cork and David Glasgow – Engine: Beta 25hp Diesel – Location: United Kingdom

 

Historical:

ATHENA was designed and built as ILDERIM in 1939 to 3rd International Rule for Swedish banker Marcus Wallenberg Jr at Tore Holm’s Gamleby yard, Sweden. Wallenburg had been disappointed in his attempt at the 1936 Olympic title: sailing the previous ILDERIM, a politically influenced decision had found him relegated from the Gold Medal position to fourth. Wallenburg subsequently challenged the Germans and Italians for Coppa d’Italia, the European championship for the 8-Metre class, at Genoa in 1937 and 1938, winning on the second occasion and taking the cup home to Sweden. For the 1939 defense, he commissioned this ILDERIM, again from the board and yard of Tore Holm. She too was successful and won the last challenge for the Cup before the Second World War, beating, among others, such renowned 8mRs as PINUCCIA, SIRA, and GERMANIA III.

In her design, the ever innovative and competitive Holm exploited a then loophole in the rule by raising the deck height at the mast. The initial design actually had no coach house as we know it – simply an extension aft of the raised deck. But in consultation with the IYRU this radical departure from the norm was toned down to the very attractive as-built and instantly recognizable configuration. Her forward crew also find it very comfortable when heeled!

Wallenberg named all his boats ILDERIM: a Turkish word which can be translated as “Thunderbolt”. He retained the name when he sold this one to one of his employees in 1945, and after the war he built other ILDERIMS. She later had a variety of names in her native Sweden including SILVERVINGEN, again ILDERIM, AMIGA and under the ownership of her last Swedish owner, Ingmar Bergman’s photographer Bengt Wanselius, AMORITA.

On being brought to the UK in 2002 by Avia Willment she became AMOREVITA, undergoing a major refit at Casse Tete, Hamble Point. When the present owners acquired her in 2006, it was decided to revert to a more classical name, and since the ILDERIM of 1936 had recovered that name, the new name ATHENA was chosen. This reflects the legend that ATHENA was the daughter of Zeus in Greek mythology. Zeus, who owned the Thunderbolt, gave it to his daughter to assist her in conquering the Athenians.

At the Metre Regatta in the Solent in 2007, ATHENA found herself on the same racecourse as PINUCCIA for the first time since 1939, and the result was the same. She forms part of the “Neptune” group of boats within the 8mR class. The Neptune Cup is awarded annually to yachts sailing with rigging and equipment which would have been available when they were built. Ironically, she was the first boat in her class to be built with a full metal rig – in this case steel, which is now barred under the Neptune Cup rules for classic boats, which require wooden rigs.

Athena has competed at World Championships in 2007, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2017 and 2019, travelling all over Europe to do so.

 

Owners Comments:

Having bought the boat in the autumn of 2006, our first racing season was 2007. In that year, we took her to the Clyde to take part in the Centennial World Cup. She later competed at World Cup regattas at Hyeres (2009), Cowes (2012), La Trinite (2014), Hanko (2017) and Cowes, again, in 2019. Fortunes varied, but with an amateur ethos in the crew we have thoroughly enjoyed sailing this beautiful boat against the best in the World. She has also taken part in the Panerai Classic series in the Solent for the last ten years.

 

Restoration

ATHENA has been sailing and racing pretty well continuously ever since she was built, but she has nevertheless had two major refits. The first of these was in her home country of Sweden over the period 1985-1989, and the second was shortly after arriving in the UK in 2002. Since then she has been boat-yard maintained, initially by the Metre Shed at Universal Boatyard, Hamble, and latterly by Lallows at Cowes. Both these yards have highly professional and experienced wooden boat building personnel, and she has spent every winter out of the water and under cover.

 

Provenance (The Wall of Remembrance – The Owners, Crew & Notable Guest):

Owner/Guardian: (1939) – Marcus Wallenberg, Jr, Swedish banker
Owner/Guardian: Ingmar Bergman
Owner/Guardian: Avia Willment
Owner/Guardian: (2006 – Current) Jonathan Cork and David Glasgow

 

Sail Number

N.G. Herreshoff “Athene” Specifications:

LOA: 106′ 0″ / 32.30m – LOD: 83′ 4 / 25.40m – LWL: 70′ 0″ / 21.33m – Beam: 19′ 3″ / 5.86m – Draft: 10′ 10″ (centerboarder) / 3.30m – Displacement: 75 gross 67 net tonnes – Sail Area: 6,000 sq ft – Yard Number: 520 – Hull Material: – Designer: N.G. Herreshoff – Built by: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company, Bristol, RI – Year Built: 1899 – Original Owner: William Otis Gay, Boston, MA – Homeport: Marblehead, Massachusetts – Former name(s): Talayha (1928-1935), Athene (1935-) – Original Price: $27,125 – Status: Lost May 31, 1943 off Miami, Florida after a collision with the steamship John Owen

 

Historical:

Athene was built just before the all-out racers, the Herreshoff 70s, as a centerboarder with bulwarks.

Mr. Gay once asked his yachts designer “Mr. Herreshoff isn’t there some condition when the Athene could beat the new 70s?,” Herreshoff replied “Yes, when there is less than 15 feet of water.”

Athene was to be delivered by Decoration Day, but it wouldn’t be until late October that she arrived from Bristol to her new home in Marblehead, Massachusetts, just in time for her first sail in a snowstorm.

 

June 30, 1900 Eastern Yacht Club’s Puritan Cup Race (off Marblehead): in ‘hurricane-like’ conditions….. All boats dropped out but two…. ‘Athene’ (106′) and schooner, ‘Constellation’ at 136 feet……. In Herreshoff’s words ….

 

“Twice around the course they went, thirty miles in a howling northwest gale. ‘Constellation’ parted a halyard and ‘Athene’ broke her gaff jaw but they carried on and finished with ‘Athene’ winning seven minutes boat for boat and twenty-four minutes corrected time.”

”As ‘Athene’ approached the finish line she got a heavy knockdown and became partly unmanageable. Although her topmast was housed and she was under jib and mainsail, the water came way up to her hatches; they could not get at the jib sheets to let her up in the wind and had to chop them with an ax. There was a remarkable photograph taken of ‘Athene’ in this race, and no doubt some of the readers have seen it at the Eastern Yacht Club…………..”

 

 

1915 – First private yacht to pass through the Panama Canal, enroute to San Francisco – Rammed in 1941 off Miami, Fl and sunk. Similar to the NYYCs seventies.

 

Provenance (The Wall of Remembrance – The Owners, Crew & Notable Guest):

Owner/Guardian: (1899-xxxx) William Otis Gay, Boston, MA
Owner/Guardian: (1908-1915) TP Burgess

 

Resources

Photo and text courtesy of Androck Washburn, Great Grandson of Theodore P. Burgess.
Herreshoff, L. Francis. The Wizard of Bristol. The Life and Achievements of Nathanael Greene Herreshoff)