179 



himself entirely to sailing at the meets and on the river, hut he is 

 also an expert with the gun, the open Canoe and the single blade, 

 spending some time each spring and fall on hunting expeditions. 

 Hp is now talking of giving up canoe racing for yachting on the 

 St. Lawrence, having reached a pni-,t where he can with propriety 

 follow the example of Messrs Gibson and Brokaw, who have re- 

 tired on their laurels. 



RACING RULES AND STANDING SAILS. 



A S an exhibition of fine workmanship the fleet that was strung 

 -p. oui along the beach at Jessup's Neck during the recent A. a 

 A. meet was far m advance of anything yet known in canoeine: 

 Irorri the canoes of the \ esper men at one end down to the fleet of 

 tne married raters" on the beach at Squaw Point were more hand- 

 some canoes than have ever been brought together before in the 



omely old canoe, a boat much the worse for age. but wit? a his- 

 tory, nevertheless, that carried us back to the beginning of 

 organized canoeing in America, and that suggested some curious 

 comp nsons between the fleet of to-day and tnose of past periods. 



ibis canoe was built m 1878, the date of a great awakening in 

 American canoeing, when the seeds long planted began to give 

 positive evidence of life and g'owth. bhe was. if we are not 

 greatly mistaken, the flist centerboard canoe, being fitted with a 

 smaJl trunk and a dagger board; "nd, further than this, she was 

 the Urst canne with the pointed, flaring coaming which has since 



,^,? m ? n . m ^ SR h S , he vvas bunt °y George Honhr, of Harlem, a 

 skillful shell builder long since dead, who sailed her a little him- 



It lf; w Ut -M \ 88 £- ot ] .??° tbat she was flrsr PUhiiclv raced as 

 the Wraith, by Mr. Wru. WhiUock. Later on she was sold to Mr. 

 L. y. Jones, of Hartford, and under the name of Venture she be- 

 came one of the famous boats of the old racing days ac Grindstone 

 when Yaux owned the Dot and Gibson the Snake. 



Looking a.t her, the work of one of the best men of the day and 

 certainly ahead of her times in many respects, one realizes 'fully 

 tne great advances that have been made in model and construc- 

 tion of late years, and trie first conclusion is that the work of the 

 American Canoe Association, whose rules and races nave been 

 the controlling factor of this advance, has been an unequivocal 

 success. Unfortunately, however, the sight of the old boat hrings 

 back many memories and suggests other points of comparison 

 than model and finish, until, after a careful scrutiny of the new 

 fleet in all its details, one may be left in honest doubt as to 

 whether the many and great changes have been in advance or 

 retrogression. Keen as the racing is now, it does not exceed that 

 of five years since, the first year of the record, when the en'ries 

 were proportionately as numerous, and tne competition as close 

 The fleet of that year was made up of such canoes as Snake, Sea 

 Bee, Day Dream, Nirvana, Sofroma (these five standing first on 

 the or giual record of 1885), Thetis, Katri na, Marion B. Guenn No 1 

 a fleet thaL would make but a sorry showing at. first sight beside' 

 the raeers of to-day. Whatev r they were in speed and appear- 

 ance, however, they possessed one substantial characteristic, they 

 were canoes that baa cruised, that could ciuise, and that, apart 

 from their work as racers, did good service for their owners in a 

 dozen different ways. 



From this p >int of view, and certainly it is a fair one, the new 

 fleet, in all its glory of handsome lines and elaborate finish, 

 makes but a poor sl owing; and it is no wonder that many of the 

 more thoughtful »nd conservative members of the Asscciation 

 are ready to call a halt in further progress until it is known just 

 where the ond is likely to be. The canoes which came to the meet 

 to race, and it is getting to oe more and more the fashion to bring 

 no canoe, or at most an open paddler unless a man comes to race 

 mai be clatsed all under one head as racing machine, with a few 

 strongly marked characteristics. There were some few that were 

 fitted for the real work of canoeing and ciuising, a few mote that 

 might be altered eo as to be suitable for such work, and of the 

 raters some possessed less of certain undesirable features than 

 others, but the majority were of one type, whose leading ft atures 

 may be summed up as follows: A hull of good dimensions and 

 model for ordinary canoeing work, though in ome cases of rather 

 light build: a sail plan tbat, whetner with hoisting or fixed sails 

 is of extreme dimensions and often of exa, gerated prop rthns; a 

 .cockpit that is now nothirg more than a silz bath and is rapidly 

 contracting into merely a small copper foot bath; a centerboard 

 that occupies the entire center of the canoe, that shows half its 

 breadtu above the deeli when raised; ard last of all a heavy slid- 

 ing s»at, of wood and metal, almost 4ft. long, on which the canoe- 

 ist, save the mark, sits or even stands. 



Such craft as this, expensive and delicate as they are, can be 

 used for but one purpose, match racing. They must be launched 

 tendeily from the club fljat or from the stage at the meet; some 

 will not stand up under their spars without a man in them: no 

 paddie is carried because theie is little or no need to use it and 

 there is no room below to stow it, not even a pointer is made fast 

 to the stem in most cases, as the canoe is never left afloat without 

 a man m her. In the case of one can >e at the meet it was neces- 

 sary first to lower the board and then screw down the sliding seat 

 directly over it, so that the canoe was practically a keel craft for 

 ■he lime being, the lowtr*d board preventing her from being 

 launched from a sloping float or beach. 



If such a craft is the outcome of half a dozen years of racing 

 under the A. C. A. rules, is it not time that the rules were 

 changed? With such an extreme to-day what may next year or 

 the j ear after biing forth? Can cano-ing flourish when su-h craft 

 as these are the only ones recognized or encouraged by the organ- 

 ization which has assumed tne responsibility of guiding and 

 directing its luture? It is such questions as these, questions 

 which persist in presenting themselves to all who are in'eresfed 

 in the success and development of canoeing, that have hurrh d 

 some of the most earnest friends of the A. C. A. inio the action 

 which we condemned last week; and while we differ fiom them 

 as to the means employed, we are heartily in sj mpath . with' the 

 spirit which animate d them. That a grtai and increasing evil exists 

 mere can be no doubt, and the future welfare of canoeing, and 

 especially of the A. C. A., demands an effort to remedy it; the 

 question is whether the prohibition of standing sails is the proper 

 and only step. 



The policy of the Association up to the present time has been 

 one of ' Laissez faire, luissez a7<er," the various administrations 

 declining positively to piace auv restrictions on new features, 

 nowever undesirable they might promise to become in time. With 

 this view we have always disagreed, holding that it was the duty 

 of the governing powers, representing as a rule the oldest and 

 most experienced element ot the Association, to use the power 

 given them in the control of the racing rules so as to prohibit or 

 limit any dangerous or undesirable teatures, and to turn the 

 whole influence of the rules and the racing toward the improve- 

 ment of the canoes which gave a name and existence to canoeing, 

 rather than to the development of a special type of racinir ma- 

 chine. In accordance with this belief, and in view of the more 

 rapid disappearance of cruising canoes and of cruising qualities 

 in the racers each year, we advocated several years since some 

 radical changes in the rules, one of the most impm tant of which 

 was the limitation of the standing rig. Then, when the standing 

 rig was yet in its infancy and big plate boards were few in num- 

 ber, a change of the rules might have been made without serious 

 injustice to any one, bur, that time has gone by, and the condi- 

 tions have changed materially. There has come into existence a 

 large and costly fleet, manned by the racing blood of the whole 

 Association, a fleet so large that to legislate it out of existence 

 would be unjust and impolitic, even if it were possible. 



The danger of tne standing rig per se, that was so eloquently set 

 forth at the recent meeting, is so trivial as to be of no importance 

 one way or tne other compared with the many greater evils. The 

 great trouble to-day is that the Asso iation is doing absolute ly 

 nothing tor the advancement of cruising, the improvement of 

 cruising ci aft, and the invention of new and improved cruising 

 and camping appliances out such influence as it has, through i he 

 racing rules, is directed entireiyt" a crafcthat cannot by anypos- 

 sioility be used for cruising. Under such circumstances the abol- 

 ition of the standing rig is a most absurd and inadequate measure; 

 of itself it amounts to nothing and if any substantial r> form is to 

 be accomplisned, the executive committee must proceed to much 

 more extreme measures. The development of the racing canoe, 

 in other words, the crowding out of such craft as have made 

 canoeing, and are used to-day by a large majority of canoeists in 

 all parts of the world, by a racing machine, has gone on unre- 

 stricted until it is too late to stop it by any such halfway measures 

 as the abolition of the standing rig. 



Looking now at the special merits and demerits of the standing 

 sail, it must be plain tnat the cnief point urged against it at the 

 meeting, its danger, amounts to nothing in itself; no such broad 

 generalization as tbat the standing sail is dangerous and the hoist- 

 ing sail safe, can be truly made. Iu sizes not over 40ft., and the in- 

 ventor of the sail, Mr. K. H. Barney, has more than once said to us 

 that somewhere near this was the practicable limit of such a rig, 

 the danger is purely imaginary, the sails are small, licht, simple, 

 and may m case rf emergency he easily unshipped, or if carried, 

 can ao little harm. Tne Pecowsic'- ng was safety itself compared 

 with some rigs seen in the races, areas of 150ft., nominal! v lower- 

 lag* but m practice utterly unmanageable m a violent squall or 

 When any breakdowa happens, It is true that a atanding sail like 



