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Mullingar Sailing Club

Doyen of the Dinghies
Jack Holt: 1912 - 1995

by Barry Pickthall
PPL Ltd, Booker's Yard, The Street, Walberton, Arundel, West Sussex, UK

www.pplmedia.com

Jack Holt was a doyen of the racing dinghy world whose innovative plywood constructed boats did most to revive sailing after the second World War and spread the sport world-wide. In a 60 year career that began on the River Thames at Hammersmith London, he spawned more than 40 class designs, his most famous being the ISAF recognized International Enterprise, Mirror and Cadet classes, together with the GP 14, Heron, Hornet and Miracle. Today, more than 250,000 of his designs can be found in Britain, North America, Australia, South Africa, India and across Europe.

The son of a panel beater, Jack Holt was born at Hammersmith, London in 1912 and soon showed a natural affinity with the waters. A member of the local troop of Sea Scouts, he helped add a little excitement to sailing the group's staid naval whaler by jamming the sweeps under the leeward gunwale and climbing out to the end of the extended oars to improve the balance and speed of the boat. Seeing this remarkable display of agility in the fast flowing River Thames caused such consternation that sailing was banned within the troop.

Jack promptly left and, together with his brother, bought 'Winnie' an ageing 14ft lug sailed clinker dinghy for 7 pounds 10s from the novelist AP Herbert who lived nearby. They paid for its upkeep by doing odd-jobs on other boats which supplemented Jack's meagre earnings as an apprentice joiner.

This promising career was cut short when, at the age of 17, his right leg was shattered in a motorcycle accident. He was in and out of hospital for the next two years and ended up with one leg 2 inches shorter than the other, but though encased in a waist-high plaster cast for much of this time, it did not stop him sailing.

During that convalescence, he built an 18ft half decked clinker dinghy in the back garden. Recalling one early lesson, he admitted many years later. "The ground was rather uneven and she finished up with a plank more on one side than the other". Despite this, 'Candlelight' enjoyed a successful racing career at the London Corinthian Sailing Club, winning many races on handicap. The boat also demonstrated Holt's innovative skills at solving problems. Because of his long convalescence, he hardly had two brass farthings to rub together and could hardly afford to build the boat, let alone the costly mast track and sail slides needed to complete her. Instead, he came up with the idea of cutting a groove up the back of the mast and slotting the bolt rope edging the sail, inside it. Three sailmakers said it was totally impractical and Jack finished up sewing pink beads to the sail to act as links to his grooved mast, but his idea soon spread right through the sport.

When his great uncle, John Holt, died in 1929, Jack took over the tiny wooden hut on Lower Mall, Hammersmith where he had operated a boat repair business. It was the start of an illustrious career that continued right through to his death. Only two weeks before his death, he was enthusiastically working on plans to re-vamp his GP 14 dinghy design to be relaunched at the London Boat Show in January, but was just as adamant in fighting proposed changes to his Enterprise design to remove the handles on the foredeck.

One of his first boats was Ace, an International 14 which won the prestigious Shackleton trophy the day after her launching. and was followed up with more winners like Rapier and Preface. These successes cut little ice with the upper class attitudes then dominating the sport, and his boat was largely sneered at when Holt turned up to compete at Cowes against such luminaries as Stuart Morris and Peter Scott. This cold shoulder treatment so incensed Beecher Moore, a young American publisher then crewing for Stuart Morris, that he made it his business to seek out this upstart once back in London. The two became firm friends, often crewing for each other and the relationship developed into a business partnership that survived for 50 years.

Holt's driving ambition was to provide economical boats for the masses rather pander to the cliquey upper set which refused him membership to their yacht clubs - because he was a tradesman. He succeeded better than any of his contemporaries to become the most successful designer in the world.

Using plywood as the primary material, he first post-war design was the Cadet, a 10ft junior trainer just as popular today, which cost just £34 in kit form and could be built by the children who sailed them.

Then came the General Purpose 14, better known as the GP 14, followed by the car toppable Heron, the exciting 16ft Hornet which, despite costing little more than 95 Pounds, came closest to beating the vastly more expensive Flying Dutchman class as the International Yacht Racing Union's choice for the Olympics.

The Solo, a sweet singlehander with beautifully sculptured side decks was always his favourite design, but three, the Enterprise, Cadet and Mirror which led to the birth of simple 'stitch and glue' amateur building system, all gained international status.

Jack Holt was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1979 for his services to sailing and was also presented with a Golden Anchor, the highest award given by the sport by Britain's Royal Yachting Association.

A slight man with a shock of white hair, he was quiet, shy and unassuming, but few people in the sport today will not either have sailed or owned one of his designs. He was an ordinary man who achieved extraordinary heights, and whose legacy to the sport he loved will live on for many years to come.