Identify that boat

[baddoggoodlife]

Just recently, I’ve come across two different examples of an oddity in the Sailfish world. Or is it?
A 12 foot board boat, seemingly to be everything a Sailfish is, but with a boxy snub nose, and a stylistically different toe rail and mast base.
Anyone seen these before?
Is this what the Sailfish was, before the Sailfish was the Sailfish?
Was this a clone boat?
I figured this was a bastard one-off, but then I saw another.
One had a “newer” Alcort releasing rudder, and the other had a basic fixed rudder.

Thoughts?

 

[L&VW]

Thoughts:

1) New Hampshire taxes sailboats over 12 feet in length.

2) Include the word "scow" in your searches...

 

[signal charlie]

Well we don't know what came out of the minds of the folks at ALCORT, but we do know that they started building the 11' 7" Sailfish in 1947 to expand their ice boat (Icefish?) business. The boats up until 1953 had some other type of simple hinged rudder.

From these photos we see a pointy bow and handrails similar to later years. But who's to know what they prototyped? Our 1953 Sunfish has large open cutouts in the cockpit bulkheads, and limber holes, so the original design concept was quite different.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

Always fantastic information, thanks!

My first thought was that I was looking at a ‘standard’ that had a fix of a broken nose, and then I find an identical one a hundred miles away….
My from the hip thought is that these might be pre-53 Sailfish. The blunter nose remind me of the old wooden rescue boards that we used at the Connecticut state parks back in the day.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

And now for the bonus round:

It has the long coamings like the first gen Sunfish, but a closed footwell, sweeping trim around the footwell, and the combings start at the mast.
You tell me…

 

[signal charlie]

I'm gonna guess 1) that when Alcort built 20 prototypes for family and friends, they were not all the same. And the feedback on this one led to not putting those uncomfortable lumpy things all around the cockpit.

2) It could be a "One Piece At A Time" Sunfish kind of like the Cadillac from the Johnny Cash song

 

[baddoggoodlife]

I'm gonna guess 1) that when Alcort built 20 prototypes for family and friends, they were not all the same. And the feedback on this one led to not putting those uncomfortable lumpy things all around the cockpit.

2) It could be a "One Piece At A Time" Sunfish kind of like the Cadillac from the Johnny Cash song

Absolutely perfect!

 

[baddoggoodlife]

And the fleet keeps on growing.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

It’s the little things…
When I did my last boat, there were the little embossed anchors on the heads of the nails that came into view as I sanded away years of paint. It gave me pause as I appreciated the simple beauty of things that are there but that you don’t see. Things that note a hidden level of quality, of craftsmanship. As I began sanding away the years of paint on this new old boat, more simple reminders came into view, and gave me an appreciation for a craftsman that has long laid down his tools. Unseen for a lifetime, I uncovered the wooden plugs that cover the screws on this boats construction. It’s a simple thing, but deserving of appreciation. This was, by design, a humble boat, but a well built boat. Cheers to those who originally built what we now rebuild.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

And some other quality touches:
The well shaped wooden pieces to attach the outhaul pulley base to the lower spar.
The wooden caps and tips on the aluminum, (yes aluminum!) spars, and the stubby wooden pulley extension on the mostly aluminum mast.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

Oops, I meant main sheet pulley.

 

[Wavedancer]

And the fleet keeps on growing.

Now you can have a Sailfish regatta...

 

[andyatos]

Unseen for a lifetime, I uncovered the wooden plugs that cover the screws on this boats construction.

Even lined up the grain (mostly) of the wooden plugs with the grain of the boat's wood.

- Andy

 

[baddoggoodlife]

Even lined up the grain (mostly) of the wooden plugs with the grain of the boat's wood.

- Andy

I feel like I can hear the groan from decades ago when that grain just missed being in line. And then he said to himself “no one will ever see this”…

 

[baddoggoodlife]

I’ve realized before how you can get a sense of who built something before by how it was built, sometimes.
Well, whoever built this before must have been a real Boy Scout. Literally.

 

[baddoggoodlife]

The Boy Scout magazine ‘Boys Life’ had an article with plans in their July 1958 edition for the Sailin’ Surfboard. Yep, that’s it!
It might not be a lost relic of the Alcort story directly, but it’s a great example of how the Sailfish inspired countless builders. Not exactly on my original mission to build an Alcort fleet, but I’ll have no regrets cleaning this craft up and digging into the story.