American Yachting

American Yachting by William Picard Stephens was published in New York in 1904. (408 pages)

The Publisher has copy-edited this book to improve the formatting, style and accuracy of the text to make it readable. This did not involve changing the substance of the text.

Contents:

Chapter I. Early American Yachts — Chapter II. George Steers and his Work — Chapter III. The Birth of the New York Yacht Club — Chapter IV. The Building of the "America" — Chapter V. The Winning of the Squadron Cup — Chapter VI. The Progress of Design in America and England — Chapter VII. The Day of the Great Schooners — Chapter VIII. The First Matches for the America Cup — Chapter IX. The Development of Design in America — Chapter X. The Battle of the Types — Chapter XI. Burgess and the America Cup — Chapter XII. "Thistle" and the New Deed of Gift — Chapter XIII. "Clara," "Minerva," and the Forty-foot Class — Chapter XIV. Herreshoff and "Gloriana" — Chapter XV. The Dunraven Challenges — Chapter XVI. Small Yachting and the Seawanhaka Cup — Chapter XVII. The Scow Type in Designing — Chapter XVIII. The "One-design" and Restricted Classes — Chapter XIX. Lipton and the three "Shamrocks" — Chapter XX. Racing and Cruising in Small Yachts — Chapter XXI. Steam Yachting in America.

Introduction:

.....In spite of the utilitarian tendencies of the present age, it is fortunately no longer necessary to argue in behalf of sport; even the busiest of busy Americans have at last learned the necessity for a certain amount of relaxation and recreation, and that the best way to these lies in the pursuit of some form of outdoor sport. While each has its stanch adherents, who proclaim its superiority to all others, the sport of yachting can perhaps show as much to its credit as any.
.....As a means to perfect physical development, one great point in all sports, it has the advantage of being followed outdoors in the bracing atmosphere of the sea; and while it involves severe physical labor and at times actual hardships, it fits its devotees to withstand and enjoy both.
.....In the matter of competition, the salt and savor of all sport, yachting opens a wide and varied field. In cruising there is a constant strife with the elements, and in racing there is the contest of brain and hand against those of equal adversaries. As a mere matter of healthy and exciting exercise, an hour at the tiller of a yacht in a thrash to windward will compare favorably with any other form of active sport.
.....In material and physical points yachting has much to commend it to the leading place in the list of sports; but, unlike many others, it goes much further, and can fairly claim a place among the arts and sciences as a purely intellectual pursuit. The science of yacht designing, a branch of yachting which many amateurs follow as a recreation, offers an unlimited field for study and research, both in the line of the governing principles of naval architecture, and of their application to the creation of successful vessels. The man who can design his own yacht, large or small, construct her, or at least plan and supervise the construction, and, finally, can guide her to the head of the fleet with his hand on the tiller and his active brain anticipating and checking each move of clever opponents, may well lay claim to one of the highest achievements within the reach of any sportsman.
.....The importance of yachting to a maritime nation such as ours can hardly be overestimated. It is a stimulus to the advancement of naval architecture such as is necessary in maintaining the naval and merchant fleets at the highest standard; it is a training school for seamen, both amateur and professional; and its mimic battles for the different international trophies — that first awakened and now keep alive a thoroughly national interest in maritime supremacy — are constant reminders of the necessity for perpetual progress in all details of naval development.
.....The history of American yachting is more than a mere dry record of victor and vanquished; it is a summary of material progress in naval architecture and seamanship, of researches and discoveries that have redounded to the immediate benefit of the nation and ultimately of the world at large. At the same time it is a story of hard-fought battles, of some defeats that have been turned to profit in the end, and of many notable victories.