enjoy particularly the "novelty races" in which "big-boat skippers" com- 

 pete before the club membership with boats drawn by lot and with the 

 participants in a night-before Calcutta pool egging them on. Or they may 

 engage in races in which each boat carries a balloon and each skipper a 

 stick with a pin on the end— the idea of each being to cross the finish line 

 with his balloon still inflated. 



An article in Yachting (May 1940) by Rufus G. Smith got the Penguins 

 under way on a national scale. Ella B. Leighton-Herrmann (1217 Fourth 

 Rd., Baltimore 20, Md. ) is Secretary of the association and will furnish a 

 list of the current builders— of which there are at least fourteen at the time 

 of writing. The class publishes a most interesting yearbook as well as an 

 association handbook and Penguin Patter. Hulls are of plywood or fiber 

 glass. 



The Penguin class does not publish tolerances in the rules, thus helping 

 them to become as tiiily one-design as possible. One interesting departure 

 in the Penguin rules is that four different penalties for infractions are estab- 

 lished, depending upon how seriously an infraction affects other boats in 

 a race. Besides being one of the largest classes in the world for summer 

 sailing, the Penguins have become a leading Frostbite class on Long Is- 

 land Sound and elsewhere. Prices, new, run from $550 to $650; used, 

 from $150 to $450. 



VITAL STATISTICS : L.O.A. ll'5^^"; watcrlinc ii'g"; beam 4'8"; 

 draft without board 4", with board 4'; sail area 82 sq. ft. (no spinnaker); 

 weight 130 to 150 lbs.; trailable; racing crew, two. 



PIONEER 



Similar to Explorer class, except for steel centerboard or keel and a 

 slightly higher price. See Explorer. 



158 THE SAILBOAT CLASSES OF NORTH AMERICA 



