HMCo #1080s Priscilla

"... in some ways the most interesting product of 1919 was the one-design class of 'S' boats, which came out early that spring.
While there were few of them built the first year, perhaps twenty, the company continued building them off and on for the next eight or nine years so that eventually there were perhaps a hundred and fifty or more of them, and besides being good little cruisers they have furnished active racing up to the present time in widely separated districts. If I remember right these little yachts cost less than two thousand dollars the first few years, so they have been a good investment for some owners for they were built well enough to last for years if handled carefully. Perhaps the 'S' boats would even have been more popular if they had been a little better looking but that defect should not be wholly blamed on Captain Nat for it was the request of the original sponsors of the class that they have short overhangs and full bows and sterns. This feature has made them rather queer-looking Universal Rule boats, and consequently they are not particularly fast for their rating. But there have been few all-around better boats for afternoon sailing, cruising, and racing, and perhaps also the last one-design class that was somewhat comfortable." (Source: Herreshoff, L. Francis. The Wizard of Bristol. The Life and Achievements of Nathanael Greene Herreshoff, together with An Account of Some of the Yachts he Designed. New York, 1953, p. 306.)

"1943. ... Alden Walls bought the Herreshoff S boat Nina [#1151s] from Frank Orr at West Hartford. Russ Boss, who had been looking for an auxiliary cruiser, gave the idea up and bought Reginald Reynolds' Argument [#964s] to race against Nina. It started an S boat epidemic and at the end of the season there were eight S boats in the class. Frank Hodges bought the Quissetta [#1080s] at Marion, and called her Whistler. J. W. Corr at East Greenwich bought the Naut [#970s] at Marion and named her Red Jacket. Steve Kindelan bought the Surprise [#1129s] from Reginald Lanier at Newport. Leo McDevitt bought the Mig [sic, #858s] from E. Stuart Peck of New York and named her Colleen. Harold Sawyer bought the Dilemma [#1022s] from H. B. B. Ripley of New York and Newport, making seven active boats, and Roberts Parsons bought the Volante [#1019s] but left her at Marblehead to wait for his son, Sam, to get home from the service. ..." (Source: Davis, Jeff. Yachting in Narragansett Bay. Providence, 1946, p. 116.)

... In 1960, having become disenchanted with the business of commuting to New York daily, plus other annoyances in the Big City, we came back to Barrington, to seek our fortune. The fun of getting back to Rhode Island was doubled when Everett Pearson invited me to be his 'cabin boy' aboard his S boat 'Whistler'. We raced for five joyful years with Everett until, in 1966, we joined the Ensign Class with 'Whim'. ..." (Source: Walls, Alden. "50 Years of Bay Racing." Bristol Phoenix, January 31, 1973, p. 18-19.)

"After spending six years on the hard, WHISTLER is back in Bristol condition, thanks to Jens Lange at Baltic Boat Works in Newport, Rhode Island. The Herreshoff S-boat (hull No. 1080) has a 27' 6" LOD and a 7' 2" beam and draws 4' 9". The extensive restoration included partial keel replacement, some new floors and planking, a new cabintop, major deck work, and more." (Anon. "Launchings and Relaunchings." Woodenboat #221, July/August 2011, p. 95.)

"... In addition to Keith’s Pirate [#1121s] two more Herreshoff built S boats would join the fleet that year [1929], Endicott’s Priscilla [#1080s] and Chisholm’s Iris [#1127s]. ..." (Source: Quissett Yacht Club (publ.). Glorious Good Times. The First Hundred Years of the Quissett Yacht Club. Quissett, 2012, p. 42.)

"... Harold Keith took his racing very seriously [in the 1930s]. His son Jean, who also raced Pirate [#1121s], recalled:
One of Dad’s bitterest competitors was Franklin King [owner of #1080s Quissetta ex-Priscilla], right next door! At that time the S boats were very powerful boats and fast for southwesters. People took their racing on a very strong and personal basis. There would be cocktail parties when the air was electric … because somebody had forced somebody at the buoy. I don’t think any of them knew the rules particularly well because they’d gone into racing in more or less middle life. They had a lot of fun though, and it really was the extremely active class and helped a great deal to build the yacht club.
I remember the time that Mr. King rammed us at the Uncatena bell. Now who was in the right I have no idea, but he came roaring up in his S boat. It was a strong southwesterly. He was on one tack and we were on the other and he was sure he had the right-of-way. The bow of Quissetta [whichcame right up over the coaming and if I hadn’t moved in a hurry, I’d have been hit by the bow in the back of the head…and those S boats really moved. ..." (Source: Quissett Yacht Club (publ.). Glorious Good Times. The First Hundred Years of the Quissett Yacht Club. Quissett, 2012, p. 45.)

• Benfield, James W. "Reviving the 'S' Class." Yachting, May 1945, p. 56-57, 104. (3,516 kB)
  Document is copyrighted: Yes. How the Western Long Island Sound S-class fleet was built with a deliberate strategy.
• Upham, Kenneth B. History and Register of the S-Boat. Privately printed, no place, 1994. (13,553 kB)
  Document is copyrighted: Yes, used with permission. The definitive source of info on the S-class, but unfortunately current only up to its date of publication in 1994. History of the class and its various fleets, technical comments, detailed vessel-by-vessel provenance, owner and name indices.
• Bray, Maynard and Claas van der Linde. "The Origins of the S-Boat. A Remarkable Herreshoff One-Design." Wooden Boat #267, March/April 2019, p. 74-79. (1,201 kB)
  Document is copyrighted: Yes. A short history of how the S-Class came about, including new insights from recent research of original Herreshoff documents. With photos and reproductions of the original construction and sail plans.
• Silken, Alan (text). Silken, Cory (photos). "Setting Sail in America. The Remarkable Story of Herreshoff S Class Sailboats." Seapoint Books, Brooklin, ME.
  Appreciation of the S-Class, history of the design and local fleets, portraits of surviving S-boats and a catalogue of all S-boats
• Silken, Alan (text). Silken, Cory (photos). "A Century of S-Boats. The Enduring Appeal of a Classic Herreshoff One-Design." Wooden Boat #267, March/April 2019, p. 80-85. (1,510 kB)
  Document is copyrighted: Yes. Appreciation of the S-Class and a history of the fleets in Narragansett Bay, Quisset and Long Island and a summary of the leading S-boat restorers.
• van der Linde, Claas. [No title. Note about S-Class Weight Discrepancies.] March 11, 2022. (11 kB)
  Document is copyrighted: Yes, used with permission. Copyright holder: Claas van der Linde. Note about discrepancies in published and unpublished sources of displacement of S-class boats and why 6030lbs is currently assumed to be the correct weight.

• Priscilla (MIT Museum-made index card)
• Priscilla (MIT Museum-made index card)
• Note: The vessel index cards comprise two sets of a total of some 3200 cards about vessels built by HMCo, with dimensions and information regarding drawings, later or former vessel names, and owners. They were compiled from HMCo's early days until 1920 and added to in later decades, apparently by Hart Nautical curator William A. Baker and his successors. While HMCo seems to have used only one set of index cards, all sorted by name and, where no name was available, by number, later users at MIT apparently divided them into two sets of cards, one sorted by vessel name, the other by vessel number and greatly expanded the number of cards. Original HMCo cards are usually lined and almost always punched with a hole at bottom center while later cards usually have no hole, are unlined, and often carry substantially less information. All cards are held by the Francis Russell Hart Nautical Collections of the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Mass.

Name: Priscilla
Type: J & M S
Length: 20'6"
Owner: Endicott, H. Wendell

Source: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company. "A Partial List of Herreshoff Clients." In: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company. Herreshoff Yachts. Bristol, Rhode Island, ca. 1931.

Name: Priscilla
Type: "S" boat
Owner: Wendell H. Endicott
Row No.: 843

Source: Herreshoff, L. Francis. "Partial List of Herreshoff-Built Boats." In: Herreshoff, L. Francis. Capt. Nat Herreshoff. The Wizard of Bristol. New York, 1953, p. 325-343.

Month: Feb
Day: 2 [sic, i.e. 21]
Year: 1928
E/P/S: S
No.: 1080
Name: Priscilla
OA: 27 1/2'
LW: 20 1/2'
B: 7' 2"
D: 4' 9"
Rig: J & M
K: y
Ballast: Lead
Amount: 4100.00
Notes Constr. Record: John Alden order. S class. 15th boat of 996 class.
Last Name: Endicott
First Name: H. Wendell

Source: Vermilya, Peter and Maynard Bray. "Transcription of the HMCo. Construction Record." Unpublished database, ca. 2000.

Note: The transcription of the HMCo Construction Record by Peter Vermilya and Maynard Bray was performed independently (and earlier) than that by Claas van der Linde. A comparison of the two transcriptions can be particularly useful in those many cases where the handwriting in the Construction Record is difficult to decipher.

"Sail numbers 66, 62, and 3." (Source: Upham, Kenneth B. History and Register of the S-Boat. No place, 1994, p. 91.)

"Priscilla was the last (15th) boat of the 996 class of S boats. There is reason to believe that every boat of this class was built in the fall of 1926 most of which were built for stock and can be shown to have been ordered to build between August and September 1926 (as determined by the date from when they were insured, see notes for individual boats of this class) and finished between early October 1926 and January 1927 (as determined by the date when they were apparently inspected by R. F. Haffenreffer, again, see notes for individual boats of this class). The Construction Record lists a contract date on February 21, 1928 which might suggest that this boat was built only in 1928, but note that other boats of the 996 class with lower hull numbers (#1035s, #1036s, and #1037s and later contract dates (August 1928) are strongly believed to also have been built in the winter of 1926/1927, which suggests that Priscilla may also have been built during that time." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. September 24, 2019.)

"Sail area approximately 425 square feet, measured." (Source: Herreshoff Manufacturing Company. Yachts by Herreshoff. The Herreshoff Manufacturing Company: Designers and Builders of Sailing and Power Craft since 1861. Bristol, Rhode Island, 1937.)

"See note about about weight discrepancies in published and unpublished sources under 'Further Reading' heading." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. March 11, 2022.)

"Ownership info from Steve Nagy's Herreshoff Registry." (Source: van der Linde, Claas. May 8, 2014.)

Note: Research notes contain information about a vessel that is often random and unedited but has been deemed useful for future research.