Seamarks: Three Pivotal Designs by L. Francis Herreshoff

摘要

In late 1923, L. Francis Herreshoff, working at the design firm of Burgess, Swasey, and Paine (BS&P) in Boston, designed his first yacht with a clipper bow-a shape that would become his artistic favorite. The yacht, a 50' schooner, was BS&P Design No. 257, and her owner was Waldo Hayward Brown. Waldo was born in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1896, making him six years younger than Francis. His grandfather, Joshua Brown, designed and built more than 40 significant commercial vessels and yachts at South Salem between 1856 and 1887. Waldo inherited this interest; he was inquisitive and bright, and as a youth haunted the shipyards of Boston's North Shore. As a high school student prowling the Marblehead waterfront, he visited the Burgess Company, then building airplanes, and he met proprietor Starling Burgess, the legendary polymath yacht designer (see page 98 for a review of Burgess's biography).