early international 12 foot

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chris
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early international 12 foot

Post by chris »

Having moved to Pembroke Dock in deepest west Wales i have been volunteering at a local maritime museum and have been set to work restoring an 'International 12 foot' dinghy. It dates before the 1928 Olympics, when the international 12 was the single handed Olympic boat, and has a direct connection with the games of that year. Many years ago it had a deck fitted and the rig was altered. She is being returned to its original layout. For a boat that is about 100 years old it is still very sound.
To see what it should look like see http://www.12footdinghy.org . the addition of a deck has not damaged the hull much, though the side benches are lost.



YWURRY International 12
Donated to West Wales Maritime Heritage Museum 2018/9 by Francis Gaydon.
This boat was originally owned by Francis’ grandfather H R Gaydon, who represented Great Britain in the 12foot dinghy class in the 1928 olympics.
YWURRY was his first 12’ but he bought a second one called IWUNDER. According to his grandson “ She belonged to my Grandfather Mr H R Gaydon, he raced her on the Crouch (Burnham-on-Crouch Essex). He soon had another 12’ built (Iwunda) and went on to race in the class during the 1920’s, gaining some notoriety he took part in the 1928 Olympics. When racing ended he was so angry that he swapped Iwunda for a radio! and converted Ywurry to use with his family, including my late Father.”

This would suggest that YWURRY is about one hundred years old. The modifications mentioned above are still to be seen. The boat shows a flat foredeck with a pair of rather substantial breakwaters that have strange lid arrangement bolted to them creating a small low cuddy. The mast position has been moved aft by about a foot and now supports a tall bamboo mast taking a Bermuda rig with a small jib. There are side decks with a thin combing making a restricted cockpit. The original side benches, mast support thwart, fore thwart are now missing. A sail bag contains three very old original cotton lug sails (one labelled ‘small’) one is in very good condition and shows little sign of hard use. One of these has K8 on it, the others appear blank but may show old stitching of numbers so I will investigate further. The more modern main and jib are there too but are made from the soft silky terylene material and must presumably date from the fifties rather than the thirties. i have seen a photo showing it sailing in the mid thirties with a foredeck but no side decks. Among the sails are some rigging parts, an oarlock, one belaying pin, and a lead weight ‘sinker’.


1928 Olympics
(The following is mostly sourced from the Official Report of the 1928 Olympiad found here. https://digital.la84.org/digital/collec ... 351/rec/10
The yachting report starts at page 853, which is really page number 861 on the actual report.)

The 12 foot dinghy class had the most entrants in the sailing events at twenty.
Most countries sent one helm but a reserve was allowed; France, Poland and Great Britain sent reserves. GB sending G. Fowler with H R Gaydon listed as reserve. In the results table however Gaydon is shown above Fowler suggesting he helmed in the contest. The race list shows the entrants for France and Poland in the order they appear in the first entry list. I am making an assumption that this is the case but I may be wrong. Perhaps there was some dispute here which caused the anger Francis Gaydon referred to. However GB got through to the final contest of four races having come within the top ten. In one race in the final series he was given last place with a note saying "bumped no.3" . No. 3 (Norway) was also involved in another collision earlier with a different boat yet went to take silver. (the bone of contention perhaps) . The first part of the contest consisted of four races, the fleet of twenty being divided into two groups of ten boats, the grouping being sail no.s 1 to 10 and 11 to 20 and then odds and evens for alternate races. The finals consisted of ten boats in four races. Britain sailed in boat no.14.and acheived 8th place overall. All boats being provided by the host nation.
---------------------

The International 12' has stayed popular in the Netherlands and Italy and has a small following in the UK.
Do you know of other old ones in the UK? (a few new ones have been built and the plans are available)
Who might the builder of YWURRY, in Burnham on Crouch have been? There is no identification plate.
What is the strange ladle-shaped object containing something gooey for? ( I have a quess but have never seen anything like it before. it swings out from under the thwart.
Does the sail number K8 suggest a class number or a local club fleet number? (the class started in 1913)
Answers not on a postcard please.

IMG_1584 (2).JPG
strange ladle
(22.09 KiB) Not downloaded yet
IMG_deck.JPG
new deck
(21.18 KiB) Not downloaded yet
Pat
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by Pat »

Chris - contact Colin Blewett as he may have contacts and information since he travels his Int12 to European 12 events.
(Half Cut and What a Lark Removals Ltd)
chris
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by chris »

have done that already Pat. he has kindly lent me his drawings so that i can remake the side benches to the drawings!
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Steve
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by Steve »

Chris
I can confirm that K8 was Ywurry's class number - not just a local number. The 12' Dinghy became an International class in 1920 and the first Dinghy to be allocated a sail number (K1) was Tern in November 1920. I imagine that Ywurry received her number at the same time or soon after

Certainly Ywurry is a bit older than this - she features in a race report from Burnham Dinghy Week dated 20 June 1920.

Tbere is also mention of Harold Gaydon sailing K23 - maybe this was Iwunda?
Steve Crook
Int. 12' Dinghy - NED486/SUI-4 - Einepyk
chris
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by chris »

hallo Steve,
Many Thanks for the contact. I was certainly going to contact you at some point but i hadn't connected Steve on the CVRDA forum to Steve of the Int 12 !
Glad to know of the K8 situation, its the nearest we have to pinning a date down. Any thoughts who the Burnham area builders were at that time? there is no indication on the boat.The original spars have been located which is great and i assume they haven't been used since the 30s as i have a photo of it sailing in its altered state mid 30s. I recently saw the trophies which were also given to the museum and can send you photos they are from 1921 and 22.
we are very limited on size of photos on the cvrda website and it might be better if you like to give me an email address and i can send you all the photos.
cheers
Chris Barlow
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Steve
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by Steve »

Regarding the 1928 Games: Although there were 20 countries competing the host nation only supplied 10 hulls - all constructed by the famous German boatyard Abeking & Rasmussen. Each competitor did, however, receive his own sail and spars. Fowler and Gaydon were allocated sail number 14.

A rather bizarre method of calculating the results meant that Belgium finished in 9th place despite not qualifying for the final! Likewise, Denmark finished in 7th place despite being comprehensively beaten by the British (who finished 8th) in the final. I wonder if this could explain Gaydon's displeasure?

I have not (yet) found any indication concerning which of the two British helmsman sailed in the individual races.

Incidentally, Major Gordon Fowler (who also won a silver medal in the 8 metre class in the 1924 Olympics) was instrumental in the foundation and design of the Sea View One Design Class whose hull shape bears more than a passing resemblance to that of the Int 12' Dinghy.
Last edited by Steve on Sat Feb 08, 2020 5:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Steve Crook
Int. 12' Dinghy - NED486/SUI-4 - Einepyk
JimC
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by JimC »

> A rather bizarre method of calculating the results

Tell us more!
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Steve
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by Steve »

Jim:
The final positions were determined by counting the number of first, second, third, fourth etc. places obtained by each contestant in ALL of the races (ie: the qualifying rounds and the final).

Consequently Belgium finished in ninth place, despite not having qualified for the 'finals', thanks to having finished second in the first (qualifying) race in group 2.

Likewise, Denmark's results trumped GB's results thanks to a second place and three fourth places in the qualifying round despite Denmark having two DNS's in the finals.

There were four races in the final. Had they simply counted three of these (with one discard), Italy would have taken bronze and GB would have finished 7th rather than 8th.

I presume that this method was agreed and known before the Games - but the results could explain Harry Gaydon's annoyance...
Steve Crook
Int. 12' Dinghy - NED486/SUI-4 - Einepyk
chris
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by chris »

i see Gordon Fowler is mentioned in the article from 30 years ago in Classic Boat mag, by John Leather. Fowler took a Morgan Giles 12 footer to the riviera for a contest, perhaps in attempt to encourage a 'better' design, which did not take off. apart from that i can't find any other reference to him. He went to the olympics with Gaydon.
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Steve
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Re: early international 12 foot

Post by Steve »

chris wrote: Thu Feb 06, 2020 11:23 am Any thoughts who the Burnham area builders were at that time? there is no indication on the boat.
Hi Chris
I've been doing a bit of digging...
The only yard in the Burnham area that were definitely known to have been building Int 12s at this time was William Yardleys.
Given that this boat yard was situated on the Quay, just east of the Royal Burnham Yacht Club, it must be a likely candidate!
Yardleys was founded in the late 1800s but went into liquidation in 1933.
Steve Crook
Int. 12' Dinghy - NED486/SUI-4 - Einepyk
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