Powerboat history
 

So.... after hanging out in these forums for a while, it seems to me that there are some stories that you are assumed to know, especially regarding companies and people and how they are related. For example, I didn't understand the relationship between Hustler and Outerlimits until I read a story in Powerboat - then the light bulb clicked on.

Similarly, it seems like there is some history between Apache and Cherokee and maybe Cigarette? And I saw a post today about a Sutphen that's for sale - heck of a nice looking boat, but I'd never heard the name before.

I searched out and read T2x's posts about "Great moments in Cat history" a while back, and while I didn't know half (OK, most ) of the names it was an enjoyable read.

So which of you OSO members can give a short history lesson on some of the more obscure offshore brands? How are Active Thunder and Powerplay related (or are they?) Sutphen? Magnum? I'm just scanning the Owner's boards section and realizing that I've never seen an example of most of the brands listed... how 'bout schoolin' me up on this stuff?

Since no Offshore historians seem to be present at the moment, here is a great place to start...This is a truly great Offshore [power]Boating website:

NJPPC Archives

:cool: :)

Magnum, Cigarette, Donzi, Formula,Squadron, and USA Racing were all built by Don Aronow. He also had a hand in designing some Apache boats. Sutphen is built by Ritchie Sutphen out of Florida not sure about some of the others, hope that this helps you some.

Please chime in to fill the holes or even incorrectness of my history this is what i have been able to peice togther so far on my boat & the start of the Offshore Performance Boat lifestyle...................................

When Donald Joel Aronow, landed in Miami in 1961 after retiring from his construction business in New Jersey, he became fascinated with the local racing crowd, then dominated by Dick Bertram. Don wanted a piece of this action, so he created a company called Formula Marine in 1963 for the sole purpose of making race boats & beating Dick Bertrams Moppies. Formula was really a loose association of people interested in race boats and was conceived more as a tax shelter than a production company. One of the people involved was a fellow named Jim Wynne. Jim and his partner Walt Walters designed one boat for the "formula" company. This being the famous 233 which used his sterndrive system, and was, as far as I can tell, his very first production boat design. Formula had two models at the time, the other being a 27 footer designed by Peter Guerke which was an inboard. Formula Marine was sold to the Thunderbird Marine company, run by Dick Genth in 1964. By 1965, Aronow's new company, "Donzi'" was exploding with brand new Wynne designs: A little 16, which was heavily influenced by the design of the Wyn-Mil II, two 19 footers and the Donzi 28. In 1966, Wynne and Aronow had a fallingout of sorts. This involved the winning of a race by Wynne and a t-shirt with the number 009 on it. And Wynne went on to design boats for Genth's Thunderbird Formula Company & Don went on to start Cigarette. The 233, still has features that show Ray Hunt's influence on Wynne's early work. If you compare the strake to chine patterns of the Jr and 233, you'll see they are more Bertram than Formula :)

books to check out :
King of Thunderboat Row & SeaRace
Also See
http://freespace.virgin.net/john.moo...nt/class1/1960's.htm
http://www.njppc.com/library.htm

That's close. You left out Magnum in the gap between Donzi and Cigarette. I worked for Don at Donzi, and was sold with the company to Teleflex. If you have any pointed questions, I did 30 years at Donzi, Nova, Cary, Magnum, Cougar, Cigarette, AlphaZ and a few others.

Allan Brown

I was hoping we would here from you Mr. Brown :D :D :D :cool:

I never can get that quite right need your expertise;)

hey brownie, do you have any cool info on the 27 sport magnum. it has to be my favorite boat of all time. i dont own one yet but i am seriously looking for the right one, a project if possible. would like to run small blocks and brovos. i here they still have the molds at magnum.

great idea for a thread dockrocker :cool: :cool: this ought to be good

oh . . .an several of the apache molds were bought by saber marine and are being built in limited numbers. they are a custom builder up here in michagan. they turn out some nice units. :cool: :cool:

Brownie Didn't you name Magnum after a Bogart movie or something??????

Glassdave, last report has it that Magnum will still build you a 27 Sport, but it won't be cheap! Also, Magnum Marine recently built a few outboard center-consoles using the original 27 hull, and that boat was shown at the 2001 Miami International Boat show. For the first time ever, the were no Magnums or Magnum Marine booth at the most recent (2002) Miami Show.

Brownie or anyone, do know what's up with Magnum these days and why they wern't at the show?

How 'bout Magnum 27 Sport, stroker small-blocks, and Arnesons?

. . . still working on getting the Arnesons!

Glasdave the original 27 Magnum was actually 28’ and built by Harry Schoell and there was also a 23’ Magnum the Scarab 38 was a stretched from a 27’ Magnum as I understand the story .

Best Regards :)

Re; Billy Sirois
Where is he, and did he have a role in developing some surface drive stuff?

vonwolske Yes he did as a matter of fact and the Arneson surface drive is popped off of it IMHO ( some bad blood there ) also involved were Doug Janish and Tommy Adams listed on the Patent BTW I heard Bill Passed away and hope it is not true .

Best Regards:(

Steve 1 give me a call sometime. You seem to be one of the most knowledgeable on the board. I want to talk tech with you. 512 657 1104

vonwolske

Thanks and It would be my Pleasure

Best Regards:)

Sirois bit the big one three years ago. He was a dear friend. He and Doug Janisch developed (almost) the first modern highspeed surface drive. Their financial backer was Tommy Adams, the well known ****. Had he not pulled the rug, I'm sure that they would have whipped it. Both of them are smarter than the average bear, with the possible exception of choosing a partner. I have heard (rumors only) that Katrin is taking Magnum back to Italy. They do have the 27' mold, but their prices are out of sight. One of you mentioned the 23' and 28' Magnums. Harry Schoell designed and built both of them. Don's late-60's World's were in the 28' which is probably the best riding of that size ever built. The 23' was the first Formica mold I ever saw, built by Harry for Dr. Bob Magoon. It is the basis of about a hundred pop-offs, like Excalibur, Jaws, Pantera, Superboat and that bunch of skinny 23' to 29' boats. Yes, I named Magnum while watching "Mad Dog" Bogart in High Sierra. The gas pump at the diner was "Magnum" gasoline. Since the first boat was 35', I wanted to call it the Magnum 357, but it never quite made it.

BROWNIE,
Please keep them coming! The first time I saw you post I had to do a double take. Wow “BROWNIE” for us old timers the name conjures up thoughts of “Big Water” = “Big water Boats”. You, Steve1, and T2x should start a thread called “The Characters of offshore” I have tried to get T2x to do it, but “no dice” I guess he likes living in this country, and besides he said he does not look good in sunglasses and a disguise. I don’t know what he is worried about; I don’t think they have access to OSO in the Miami-Dade correctional system. Again, it is great to have another “legend” sharing with us.
Philip (not my real name) LOL

Welcome to the board Brownie.:) I'll be right back I'm going to get some popcorn.:cool:

Keep it coming this is what I joined OSO for. The other 99% of the BS doesn't compare to this great info. Thanks to those that know.:) :)

Thanks Brownie;
That sort of verifies what Steve 1 said that Sirois first invented the surface drive. I had met Bobby Moore last year and he said the same thing. They lost out on a good thing due to no support from the "well known ****" (that is really funny) and "better marketing and a better mouse trap" from Arneson.

So tell us about the 39' Aluminum cougar with ASD's. I heard they are noisy, but that is to be expected in an aluminum boat. Tell us of the history of its development and sucesses and bad times. I really have to hand it to you and your peers for such innovative work. Your postings are 100x better than all the mountains of drivel we have to sift through to get good info and stories from guys like you and T2x. Thanks from all.

Caincando1 & vonwolske- you guys couldnt be more right, this is the kind of posts that make all the other stuff worth putting up with. i love this history stuff.

an while we are on the subject of history i know we have all seen this pic of Don and cig #1 airing it out. but does any body have any info of it. like year, the other guy in the boat, length and power, location, if the boat still exists . . .any thing at all. this is like the coolest pic and it is the background on my desktop.

It was in the 1969 Gateway Marathon, from West Palm Beach to Lucaya and back. Knocky House is on the right, and I don't remember who is in the center. For that matter, I don't remember how many drinks I had last night! Don won the race, but was nearly disqualified for not wearing his helmet. I was the chairman of the Offshore Commission in those days, and allowed him to lie out of it. He sold that boat to one of the Italians, I think Francesco Cosentino. He was basically alone against all the 31' Bertrams (Including our "Bossa Nova, driven by my partner, Billy Wishnick, and throttled by none other than Bobby Gene Moore. This was the first boat set up for a dedicated throttleman). It never bothered him, though, as he kicked their butts on a regular basis.

Hey Brownie, remember Jay Smith from the Cleveland area? He got me converted back in 85, and talked me into bringing offshore to Western NY. The first event was in 86 on the Niagara River in conjunction with a hydro race I was chairing. Then we ran divisionals and kilos on Lake Erie (Buffalo) and the inner harbour. I think we may have met befor, maybe at the Ceasar's.

Humphrey

I agree this is what joined for as well if you do a search on Donzi.net there are some Awesome treads with Mr. Browns, Forest, & Big Bad Donzi's thoughts & memories in them just pump in there screen names & search by the member # you'll get out of there posts. It's truly An honor to be in the presence of greatness like this & to be able to carry it on for a generation's to come is to cool.

My 14year old Brother in law asks about the offshore history all the time & I try to share what I can but my knowledge on this era is so limited.:(

But every time I see the round bottom on my F233 I think of Brownie & Don going at it in the big stuff & makes me proud to own a pedigree boat like this:)

Brownie you did race as well for a while like in 67ish was it the 30' donzi blue devil & F233 with twin vdrives right??????

Blue Devil was a 1966 28' Donzi that we built for George Couzens, our dealer in Mich. It was born with twin 427 turbo Daytonas on Casale V-drives. It was the fastest (and least dependable) rough water boat of its day. I changed the name of Fowey Rocks Lighthouse to FOOEY rocks, because we led every race that far and then blew something! We finally repowered with 427 Holman Moody 427 medium risers with Webers. Won the 1967 Gateway Marathon (WPB-Lucaya and back), second in Around Long Island in '67, and 1st, Class one, Atlantic City. Finshed second for US 1 behind Aronow, 1275 to 1250 points. Not bad considering that he won 600 points in races that I did not participate.

Worked with Roy for years. He is one of my heroes in the business. Never met a man I admire more. He is one of those guys that you never hear of who is really responsible for the day to day advances in technology, like the foot soldier who fights from hedgerow to hedgerow, then the general, who has NFI, gets the credit.