The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1904-07-31


ed over the entire solid earth
L in its short history, with the
exception only of the polar
caps of eternal ice, has gone into the
water.
A begoggled, leather clad horde of
record breakers, the automobilists
have swept over the sacred pastures
of the yachtsman, filled his waters
with weird things that look like cof-
fms and go like lightning, and in two
short months have knocked yachting
and all its traditions helter-skelter.
The auto-boat is an amphibian de-
velopment of the automobile pure and
simple. In everything except rubber
tires it is a devil wagon. 1t has the
devil wagons engine, the devil wag-
on's desperate sacrifice of everything
to speed, the devil wagons driver"
and, but for the stern invocation of
marine law at the last moment, it
would have carried into the sea the
devil wagons snortine horn instead of
the steam whistle and the siren.
Yachtsmen are falling prey to the
water automobile everywhere; but
they are converts and not leaders.
The creators of the auto-boats and
the leaders in water -autoing are auto
mobilists, descending from their pill
lars of dust to try their conclusions
amid sheets of spray. The most thriv-
mfr Ia 81,
mobile clubs with an aquatic end.
Record-breaking auto-boats are en-
gined with the motors taken by their
owners out of record breaking auto
mobiles.
So predominantly is auto-boating a
sport of the automobilist instead of
the yachtsman that the power boat
owners came within an ace of being
forced to run" their races under |
rules laid down by the Automobile
Association. The invaders call the
skipper of the auto-boat her driver"
and instead of talking of the boats
in terms referring to their length or
weight, such as yachtsmen use when
calling a boat a thirty-footer or a /
ten-ton boat, they call them by the
names of the makers of their engines,
and describe their dimensions by the
number of horsepower that is in
them. Thus thirty-foot boat is re-
ferred to as fifty horsepower gas
olene What-you-may-ca
The old-line yachtsmen of canvas
and spar are aghast The invasion
has so surprised them that they have
not been able yet to formulate CO.
herent objections to the transforma-
ton of their nautical clubs into wa
ter-carriages.
Many of the clubs have capitulated
entirely The Automobile Club of
America has been admitted as a body
to the privileges of the famous Amer
lean Yacht Club on the north shore
of Long Island Sound and to the
Manhasset Bay Yacht Club on the
south side. The latter club has prac-
tically become the leader among the
auto-boat associations. On the water
there is a measured official mile for
the test of water autos.
In the second auto-boat race of one
yacht club, the membership of auto
boatists" had grown so that seven
teen flyers were entered. In one lit
tie place, New Meadows in Maine,
there are more than forty-hve auto
boats. In Central New York, the In
has already registered nearly two hun
dred
Boat builders have been taken by
surprise as have yachtsmen. In the
list of constructors one sees few refer
ences to famous naval constructors
like the Herreshoffs or the rest. The
auto-boat defies the old laws of naval
design and build Its backbone or
keel is just enough to support the
aluminium or bronze engine. Its ribs
are as nothing, its bow is paper-like,
its stern is the square end of a box
or the sharp end of ploughshare,
and its planking is made of stuff so
thin that it won't do to tread hard
on it.
In France and Germany, where the
auto-engine took to the water first
they have been building boats that are
not even rivetted or bolted together
but stitched; and instead of ribs they
are braced with piano wire with turn
buckles.
H. H. Rogers, Jr., is going into
water-autoing with a boat that is 81
feet long and is to have in it little
terror of an engine that will develop
twenty horsepower. Yet the whole
thing will weigh only 1000 pounds
complete, and the motor is guaranteed
TO Jerk it through the water, or rather
over it, at a speed of twenty miles
an hour. To achieve this miraculous
lightness the craft is made of moth
ing except double planking OF ma
hogany of veneer thickness. s.
Even this thickness of planking is
y 100 great for some of the people who
burn with desire to pluck old Father
Time by the beard. The new Scolo-
pendra is so feet long and has only a
5-foot beam. Her cedar hull is 3-S-
inch cedar. Her forward turtle deck
is praised on account Of its strength
because it is possible for man to
stand on it" if he must Most of the