New (to me) wooden sailfish

emh56

New Member
I have found the information on this site to be really helpful as I've looked for a sailboat. Today I was fortunate to acquire a beautiful 1950s wooden super sailfish in really good condition. I think it had been stored in a garage for the past 30 years (or more) based on the layers of dust. The prior owner (who looked to be in his late 70s) got the boat from his good friend who was the waterfront director of a boys summer camp in the late 1940s-mid 1950s. The boat had belonged to the camp. Apparently the friend was fanatical about taking care of the boat. It has aluminum mast and spars, not wood, but the hardware for the rudder has the patent pending language, so given that, and the time period that it was supposedly at the camp, I think that it is early to mid 1950s vintage.
 

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Thanks! I am really excited to get it in the water. It needs some plugs and I am sure it has leaks, but the wood seems really sound given its age. I have really appreciated the detail about restoring these that has been available on this site.
 
Nice Sailfish! The sail is from a different boat (maybe a Dolphin?) but it fits and looks to be in good shape. Lay the spars on the port side when you rig it.
The spring plate sits on top of the rudder hardware, one hole under the wing nut.
 

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@Breeze Bender thanks for the rigging tip! I see exactly what you mean. We were in a rush to get the sail up to see what it looked like, but I hadn’t really paid attention to the location of the halyard cleat.

The sail is almost certainly not original but l suspect was purchased as a replacement. I looked at the dolphin sail and the official graphic is different. The fish on my sail is an appliqué in red fabric. The label printed on the sail is “southern sailmakers inc, Port Screvern, Georgia”. I can find ads for them in old boating magazines from the 50s up until the early 1970s as a loft that sold replacement sails. It has some loose stitches and is a little dirty from storage, but no holes and was well made.
 

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