From Scott:
Hi Adam,
Thanks for the photos. What a cutie. ‘Very hip keel.
I have a pretty complete registry of the R-class at home and I’ll look for this girl on it. I have attached here an incomplete register of sail numbers that I have been compiling for several years.
She’s a little small to be an optimized R as the class rating limit was 20’ under the Universal Rule and S-boats rated 18, I believe (17’?). The biggest sloops were the Js and bigger racers were all schooners. Pirate is a smallish R and measures 24’ on the WL, 39’ on deck and 8.5’ beam. Her draft is close to this boat, her displ. 9,500 lbs. John Alden designed a 44’ long R from what I understand. LFH designed Live Yankee probably the biggest R ever built – displ >15,000 lbs.
While most S-boats were one-design (the Herreshoff S in New England and Hawaii, the Bird class in San Francisco and the Pacific Coast “PC” class in San Diego), there may have been some early “one-offs” or small series-built S-boats but I don’t know. I understand there was even a T-class. They must have been pretty cute.
Many clubs used the Universal Rule levels for their class designations whether racing “Level” or with time allowances applied. Just rating anywhere under 20, this boat might have fit without being conceived as an R-class racer.
As far as the construction goes, the raised deck creates a big prob. George Owen designed a Canadian R called Riowna (later Svea) in ‘25 with a raised deck. She was quickly ruled illegal as the Rule scantlings for house tops were much lighter than for main decking and her forward half was decked like a house top. She was quickly shipped to Vancouver where she was eliminated mostly for just being too danged slow. Also, N. Herreshoff’s scantling rule calls for a single stringer in the bilge and of much greater dimensions than either of the stringers in the photo of Green Parrott’s interior (see: 3rd attachment). Please keep me in mind as this mystery unravels.
More later,
Scott
