The book of the sailboat

Front matter

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Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. A Short History of Boats 1

The first boat. Rafts and canoes. Catamarans. Early forms of boats. Coracles and goofahs. The evolution of the sailboat. Types of modern boats. Schooners, sloops, ketches, catboats, round- and flat-bottomed boats.

Chapter I

No one knows who first invented boats. Probably they were used by primitive man long before he discovered how to use bows and arrows or had even learned to chip stones into simple tools and weapons. But those early boats were not boats as we know them today, for it has taken untold centuries for mankind to improve and develop boats to their present state of perfection. It was a natural and easy matter for a savage to straddle a floating log and, thus supported, cross some pond or stream, and when some member of the tribe discovered that two logs lashed together were more comfortable and less likely to roll over and dump their passengers into the water than a single log, he no doubt felt as if he had made a marvelous invention and was probably looked upon as a prehistoric Fulton by his f ellowmen.

Later on some man found that a hollowed log was more buoyant and stable than an ordinary tree trunk and from this crude beginning rude dugout canoes were developed. Even today many races have never progressed beyond the hollowed-log state of boat-building and dugouts, forty or fifty feet in length and capable of carrying great weights, are in daily use in many lands. Some of these are very crude, heavy craft, while others are beautifully made, are light in weight and are very speedy and seaworthy.

Primitive Boats I — Dugout made from a log. 2 — Birch bark canoe. 3 — Eskimo kyak made of skins. 4 — Catamaran. 5 — Turkish goofah. 6 — East Indian balsa. 7 — Malay proa.

Quite a different type of savage craft were the canoes of bark or skins. These may have been evolved from dugouts but it is more likely that accident or chance led to their discovery. A piece of floating bark bearing some wild animal or bird may have pointed the way toward the graceful birchbark canoes of the American Indians, while a stiff piece of dried hide may have given the first hint of a kyak to the Eskimos.

However, it is useless to speculate upon the incidents that led our primitive and savage ancestors along the path to the shipyard for such matters are shrouded in the impenetrable mists of the dim and distant past. We know, however, that nearly every race possessed boats of one kind or another as long ago as there was any history and we know that the boats used thousands of years ago varied as greatly in construction, form, materials and other details as boats of today.

Strangely enough, many of the most primitive forms of boats are still in daily use. I have already mentioned dugouts, but birchbark canoes and kyaks are also used at the present time as widely as ever. It is evident that some of these prehistoric craft had been developed to the utmost point of perfection before the advent of civilization for many of them have never been improved upon. With all our knowledge we have never found any boat so well adapted to its purpose as the red man's canoe, and while we now make them of canvas instead of bark, we follow the same models as those used by the Indians centuries ago.

In certain parts of Great Britain the people still use the queer craft called coracles which Caesar found the Britons using when his Roman legions invaded Albion, and although these curious boats, that look like the shell of a turtle or half of a walnut shell and are made of plaited willow, are among the most ancient forms of boats, yet the Welsh find them superior to modern boats in many ways. Somewhat similar are the goofahs of the Orient, circular, basket-like craft made of willow wands and covered with pitch which are used upon the Tigris and Euphrates and have not changed in the least since Bible days.

In the South Seas and other places the natives still use catamarans and proas which are really nothing but two logs fastened together, and yet the most efficient and safest of life rafts used by our greatest steamships are merely modifications of these same catamarans.

The purpose of any boat is to float and support its occupants while traveling across the water, and while it seems a far cry from the coracle or the dugout to a palatial steamship or a stately, four-masted, sailing ship, yet the principle of each is identical and each serves the purpose for which it was designed equally well ; it is merely a matter of improvement, and many of the terms and names of parts which were used by the earliest sailors are still retained on our greatest liners and largest sailing vessels.

Starboard and larboard, for example, are merely corruptions of steerboard and leeboard, terms applied to- the two sides of the ships of the Vikings and referring to the great steering oar on the right-hand side of the vessel and the board dropped over the opposite side to prevent the craft from making leeway or sliding sideways through the water. The bowsprit was originally a small spritsail spread to the vessel's bow ; the stem was once the steering; the name forecastle was given to the sailors' quarters when the deckhouses were literally castles in form, and we still speak of cockpits though we seldom stop to remember that the term was originally bestowed because this open portion of a boat resembled the circular areas wherein cockfights were held.

The enormous steel frames which support the great plates of a steamship's sides are still as much ribs to the sailor as the flimsy bits of wood bent into place by the naked savage building his frail canoe, and scores of the ropes, sails, rigging and other portions of a ship's fabric retain their ancient names in a similar manner. The seaman is the most conservative of beings and adheres to every time-honored custom, belief and habit and when the last sailor and the last wooden ship have disappeared many of the terms and ways that were dear to the heart of Jack Tar will still live on and be perpetuated for all time.

It is partly owing to this unwillingness on the part of the sailor to adopt anything new or unusual which has led to the survival of distinct forms of boats, for the" seaman and boatman of every country believed the craft of his own waters to be superior to those of any other place. In rig, sail and other details each race of maritime people has preserved the traditions of their ancestors and even in neighboring localities we find boats which in form of hull, sails and rigging are absolutely distinct. Many of these are used only in one locality, one harbor or on one small island, but many others have been carried hither and thither and one can almost trace the history of a country or the wanderings of its people by the types of boats used.

Of course, the first boats were propelled by hand, either by pushing them along with poles or by rough paddles, but even naked savages soon learned that they could let the wind work for them and raised mats, skins or even bushes to catch the breeze and waft them across the water. But it was many, many centuries before man learned that he could do away with oars entirely and could sail in any direction, regardless of the way the wind blew.

Even in the time of Columbus the ships could scarcely make headway against the wind and were more or less at the mercy of every passing breeze, but once sailors discovered the secret of sailing to windward the advance and improvement of ships and rigging was very rapid. The great, cumbersome, square sails of the earlier ships were divided into many pieces so as to be more readily handled and trimmed; triangular sails took the place of the picturesque spritsails on the vessels' bows; hulls were built lower and deeper and while the number of masts varied they were reduced until two- and three-masted, square-rigged vessels, known as brigs and ships, were the standard types of ocean-going craft.

Among smaller vessels there were sloops, luggers, ketches and other types of fore-and-aft-rigged craft, and as these sails had many advantages over the square sails and their awkward yards they replaced the latter in some cases and thus barks, brigs and brigantines came into use.

Then some brilliant sailor genius did away with the square sails altogether and a new type of vessel came into existence which was called a "schooner." But conservative, croaking Jack still pinned his faith to yards and square sails and for many years schooners carried lofty topsails of the same form as the upper sails of square-rigged ships.

Today the fore-and-aft-rigged vessels are more numerous than all other rigs combined and the square-riggers, stately and beautiful as they were — the handsomest vessels ever built by man — have been almost driven from the seas. With the outbreak of the European War and the demand for ocean-going cargocarriers the old square-riggers have once more come to the fore, and in ports and harbors where a crossyard mast had not been seen for many years, barks, ships and square-rigged vessels now line the docks and are an "everyday sight. But they are only temporary and every boy and man who loves the sea and its ships should take advantage of this opportunity to view a passing type of vessels and should learn all about them, their rigging and their sails, for to them we owe much of our commerce and prosperity, our independence and our progress.

Although the cheaper, more easily handled and more simple schooners forced the square-rigged ships into the background, and while these in turn have been largely superseded by steam for deep-water voyages, yet the small boat has held its own throughout the centuries. In form, rig and other details the small boats of today vary as widely as ever, for small boats are designed and used for specific purposes and no one can say which is the best boat or the handiest rig-.

Steam and motor boats have taken the place of sailboats for business purposes in many places, but as long as men love the sea, as long as they enjoy the sting of the salt spray and the thrill of a plunging bow, as long as our eyes brighten and our pulses quicken as we grasp tiller and sheet and lee rails are awash, so long will the small boat hold its own. We may conquer distance by steam, we may annihilate time by paper-like hulls loaded with roaring] motors of gigantic power, we may travel in floating palaces called yachts, but nothing will ever be made by man to take the place of the small boat for the out-and-out pleasure and perfect enjoyment it gives the true boatlover.

Although there is an endless variety of hulls and rigs among small boats they may all be divided into a few general classes. In form of hull most boats may be grouped under two broad types: round-bottomed and flat-bottomed boats, but there are intermediate forms and there are also some kinds of boats which are a sort of hybrid or combination of both.

In rig we have the schooner, ketch, yawl, sloop and cat and while these cover the matter in a general way there is a wonderful variety in the sails, rigging and other details, and many boats which possess great advantages cannot be properly classed in any of these groups.

The best boat to use and the best rig to adopt depend largely upon the purpose of the boat and its rig, the place where it is to be used, the owner's ability as a sailor, the weather likely to be encountered, the character of the neighboring shores and waters and various other conditions.

In order to select intelligently the best boat for your use it is necessary to consider the various types of hull and rig, their advantages and disadvantages and the purposes for which they are intended, and then, knowing these things, select the one which you think best adapted to your own requirements.

Chapter II

Through countless centuries since man first made and used boats, an almost infinite variety of craft has been developed. In every land where boats of any sort are used the inhabitants have gradually evolved boats adapted to their special needs, the conditions of their seas or water courses and the work in which the boats are to be used.

In a great many countries the types of boats in use today have not changed or altered for hundreds of years, but in many other places forms, construction and other details of the boats have been changed, ideas from other lands or races have been adopted and we now find a great many different kinds of boats used for the same purpose. Moreover, with the migration of man from one place to another, boats of one nation have been introduced to the people of other lands and sometimes, in one locality, we may find boats from widely separated parts of the world being used daily side by side.

Of course these remarks apply mainly to boats used for commercial or business purposes for wherevter boats are used for pleasure one may find an infinite variety of craft whose models have been culled from every corner of the maritime world.

In every case, however, there are certain definite reasons for one type of boat being more generally used than another, and every boat-builder and user, since boats were first invented, has aimed to combine certain qualities in the construction of boats.

The three most important matters to be considered in any boat are seaworthiness, stability and speed. Which of these is of the greatest importance depends very largely upon the local conditions, the purposes for which the boat is to be used and the ideas of its builder or owner.

In some places speed is the prime consideration, in other places seaworthiness is the most important factor, while in still other localities the ability to carry heavy loads and not sink or upset is of more value than either speed or the power to resist winds and waves safely.

Thus the men who depend upon piloting vessels to an anchorage and whose earnings are large or small according to whether or not they reach the incoming vessels first, must have fast boats and seaworthiness may be a secondary consideration. Again the toilers of the sea who spend days upon the stormiest oceans fishing, lobstering or in similar pursuits must have boats which are safe in any weather and speed is of little importance, while those who use boats for transporting heavy cargoes or many passengers from place to place in fairly smooth waters, find stability of greater value than either speed or seaworthiness.

Many times, however, in fact, as a general rule, the most seaworthy boats are the most stable, while usually both stability and seaworthiness must be sacrificed

Types of Small Boats Adapted to Special Uses

I — Whaleboat. 2 — Lifeboat. 3 — Dory. 4 — Sharpie. 5 — Skiojack. 6 — Block Island boat.

to a certain degree in order to obtain great speed. But there are exceptions to all rules and many boats have become world-famous because they combine all these three qualifications to a remarkable degree.

The zvhaleboats used by the Yankee whalemen for chasing and capturing whales, are splendid examples of this. These boats are light, strong, stable, seaworthy and very fast and in these respects are probably the most perfect type of small craft ever designed. They are thirty feet in length and six feet wide, barely two feet in depth amidships and yet are capable of breasting the heaviest waves of midocean, withstanding the most terrific gales and weathering the most severe storms of any seas. Pulled by five oars they attain the speed of a motor boat; they are light enough to be pulled upon a beach or easily hoisted to a ship's davits. They sail rapidly, are easily handled and hold together when towed at express-train speed by a harpooned whale.

Moreover, their construction is so simple that even when smashed or "stove" by a whale they can be repaired easily by a carpenter and best of all they are very cheap, a new whaleboat costing complete only one hundred and twenty-five dollars. In these boats shipwrecked whalers have made some marvelous voyages and several instances are on record of men navigating the stormiest parts of the ocean for six thousand miles in these boats in perfect safety.

Somewhat similar to the whaleboats in shape are the surfboats used on the coasts of many sea-girt localities, notably on the Atlantic seaboard of our Middle States, and while not as speedy, light or staunch as the whaleboats, they ride the roaring surf and towering waves as buoyantly as seabirds and are ideal boats for use where there are heavy seas.

Lifeboats j such as those used on steamships and by the coast guard, are really modified whaleboats and surfboats, combining the good points of both and with slight alterations in proportions and construction to enable them to carry large loads with safety.

They are not as easily handled or as speedy as the whaleboats, but they are far more roomy; they are almost non-capsizable, are unsinkable and are built both of metal and of wood. The are rather heavy, however, and expensive.

For one who wishes a perfectly safe, roomy, strong boat capable of withstanding almost any weather and with good sailing qualities it is hard to find anything better than a standard lifeboat.

At Block Island, off the tip of Long Island, there is a peculiar sort of boat used by the native fishermen, which is known as the Block Island boat. In some ways this craft resembles a whaleboat and in some ways it reminds one of a surf boat, while in many of its characters it is much like a lifeboat and yet it is totally different from all. They are wonderfully staunch and seaworthy, they have great carrying capacity and sail very well. Formerly a great many were used as small cruising yachts, but of late years they have almost disappeared.

Somewhat similar to the whaleboats are the big seine boats used by the New England fishermen for pulling the great, heavy seines when catching mackerel, herring, menhaden, etc. They are very stable boats with immense carrying capacity, are easily handled and are seaworthy, but have no advantages over the whaleboats except in point of size. They do not sail as well nor are they are as seaworthy as the whaleboats.

All of the above are round-bottomed boats of the double-ended type in which both bow and stern are sharp. One would therefore assume that this style was the most seaworthy, especially as the spongers of the Mediterranean, the pilot boats of many islands and the typical fishing-boats of the European countries are also double-ended. Such, however, is not necessarily the case for the fishermen, pilots and other inhabitants of other countries use round-bottomed boats with broad sterns and some even use flat-bottomed boats and brave as heavy weather, as hard storms and as tumultuous seas as their fellows in the round-bottomed, double-ended craft.

Probably no men in the world ply their trade in rougher seas and in stormier weather than the Gloucester fishermen who fish for halibut and cod on the banks of Newfoundland and on George's Banks. The boats used by these hardy fishermen are known as dories and are flat-bottomed, high-sided, odd-looking craft which one would never imagine were seaworthy, yet in them the Gloucester fishermen ride out terrific storms and mountainous waves; they haul halibut weighing hundreds of pounds over the boats' sides without capsizing, and they sail or row them safely through winter storms in midocean when laden with fish until the gunwales are almost level with the water. Dories used by the fishermen are not beautiful nor graceful boats, but they are wonderfully well adapted to their use, and many builders have adopted so-called dory models for pleasure craft, both for motor boats and sailboats. As a rule, however, there is little resemblance between these "improved" dories and those of the banks, and the stability and other qualities of the real dories are usually lost in altering the lines for the sake of appearances.

Still another type of flat-bottomed boat which is used all along the Atlantic coast is the sharpie. The sharpie is merely a modified skiff equipped with a centerboard, but when properly handled these boats will stand a great deal of rough weather and knocking about and, moreover, they sail remarkably well. One usually thinks of sharpies as small boats but they are often forty or fifty feet in length and are sometimes built as large as small schooners and of twenty to fifty tons capacity. The great objection to sharpies and other flat-bottomed boats is that they "pound" or slap the water when in a heavy sea or among choppy waves, and to overcome this a type of boat known as a skipjack was evolved. Skipjacks are a sort of connecting link between true flat-bottomed and round-bottomed boats, for the after part of the bottom is flat while the forward portion is V-shaped and thus they cut through the seas instead of pounding on them while at the same time they slip over the surface of' the water rather than through it. Many of the fastest racing boats and the fastest motor speed boats are nothing more nor less than modified skipjacks, and for all-around use, especially in shallow waters, there are few better boats where roominess and sea-going qualities are not essential.

Just as the men whose living depends upon their boats have agreed upon the craft best suited to their needs, so the man or boy who is selecting a sailboat for pleasure should consider all the types and should choose that which best fulfills all of his requirements.

If you want a roomy boat or a boat on which to live or sleep you should choose a round-bottomed craft, for only in these can you obtain much depth or "head room" unless a very high cabin is built above the deck which always makes a boat top-heavy and unseaworthy. If the waters in which you are to use your boat are stormy, if heavy seas are common, or if you expect to make long trips out to sea or from place to place, select a boat which is noted for its seaworthy qualities, such as a whaleboat, seine boat, lifeboat or Block Island model.

If you are obliged to run ashore or to pull your boat upon a rocky or sandy beach select a flat-bottomed craft which can be hauled out readily without injury; while, if you want a boat for general utility, to use in bays and harbors and in sheltered waters and yet capable of standing any reasonable seas and ordinary storms, select a fairly deep, beamy, round-bottomed hull such as the Cape Cod or Block Island' catboat, or a similar model.

If your boat is merely an open boat for day sailing and short trips almost any type will serve, such as a dory, a sharpie, a skipjack or a round-bottomed or yawl boat. As a rule, however, you should avoid the true "open" boat for sailing, for in a boat without any deck it only takes a slight puff of wind, an instant's carelessness or a small sea to bring the rail under water and swamp the boat.

Even a very narrow deck is far better than none at all and if the deck has a good high "combing" or raised inner edge, the safety will be increased a hundredfold.

Very few boats will capsize if decently handled and not equipped with too much sail unless "tripped" by getting water over the side; but once the rail of an open boat is under water the boat will upset very quickly, for each pound of water taken in stays on the lowest side of the boat and has a tendency to carry the craft over still further.

A great deal depends upon the construction of the boat itself and still more depends upon the rig or sails to be used, and before selecting or using any boat you should be thoroughly familiar with the various parts of a boat, its construction, its fittings and its rig and should know what each and every part is for, as well as how to use, repair and care for it.

Chapter III

Nearly everyone knows that the body of the boat is called the hull, but a great many people, even those who live by the sea or who are accustomed to the use of boats, know very little about the various parts of the hull or the proper names for the different portions of it.

The principal parts of a small boat's hull are: the bow, the stem, the deck (if not an open boat) ; the keel, the thwarts, the bilge, the bottom, the topsides and the gunwales. Each of these is made up of various pieces or parts, and to portions of each different names are given. The bow is the forward end of the boat; the stem is the rear end ; the deck is the portion on top or the part which covers the open portion; the keel is the very bottom piece which extends from bow to stern ; the thwarts are the seats ; the bilge is the bottom close to the keel on either side; the bottom proper is the portion between the keel and the sides of the boat ; the topsides are the sides above the curve of the bottorn ; the gunwales are the upper edges of the topsides.

The extreme forward edge of the bow is known as the aitwater; the extreme end of the stern is known as the counter or transom; the curve from bow to stern, horizontally, is called the sheer; the sides above the water are known as freeboard; the inner edge of the decks when provided with a perpendicular edge is the combing; the open space within the edge of the decks is known as the cockpit; the extreme forward portion of the boat is called the peak; the central part of the craft is the waist; the forward part of the hull near the stem and below the water line is the entrance; the after part, on the sides beneath the water is the run. In every boat, no matter how large or small she may be, these parts are always the same.

The various parts used in building a boat are very numerous in some craft and are few in others, depending upon the size and model of the boat, but in every case similar parts have the same names and are used for the same purposes.

The upright piece, to which the sides are attached at the bow is the stem and when this is made in two parts, as is often the case on large boats, the outer piece is known as the false stem. This stem is attached to the keel by a knee and when a second piece is attached to the keel to thicken and strengthen it, the piece is called the keelson. At the stern the upright timber is called the sternpost and to this the transom, the broad flat piece at the end of the stern, is fastened. From the stem to the transom extends the planking, the plank next to the keel on each side being called the garboard stroke and the ones at the top of the sides being known as top strokes, sheer strokes or upper strokes. From keel to the tops of the sides curved or bent pieces are fastened which are known as ribs and these are attached to the keel-piece and the decks by knees. Sometimes an inner lining is placed on top of the ribs to make the inside of the boat smooth and this is known as the ceiling while the pieces that extend across from side to side and which support the decks are called deck timbers. These are the principal parts found in every boat of round-bottomed construction, but in flat-bottomed boats there are no real ribs, no bilge nor garboard strakes, no keel and no real sternpost, owing to the form and method of construction.

In a flat-bottomed boat the bottom runs across from side to side without any bilge; the entire sides are practically freeboard; straight braces or timbers replace ribs; the keel is replaced by a false keel or rubbing stroke and, except in large sized boats, the transom is held in position by the sides and bottom and no stern post is required.

In form and design the various parts of boats vary as much, or even more, than the boats themselves and there is an almost endless variety of bows, sterns, counters, etc., not to mention the forms of rudders, the variations in sheer, and other proportions of form, lines, run, freeboard, etc.

Even in one type of boat there may be a great many forms of bows or sterns in use, many designed merely to add to the appearance of the craft, others to add speed, others to make the boat drier, others to adapt it better to sailing or rowing, as the case may be; and still others to afford better facilities for using certain types of rig, gear or fishing-tackle.