PREFACE
Although this is a story of people, the boats they sailed, and the Clubs that served their mutual interests, the main character is Lake Champlain. It has been the silent character in many stories.
In the mythology of the Iroquois, it appears as "a beautiful lake, where gray rocks are crowded with... trees" in the story of the Seven Dancers. It was known to Donnacona, the Algonquin chief who, in 1535 from the heights behind Hochelaga (now Montreal), pointed out to Jacques Cartier the country toward the South, speaking of rivers, seas, lakes, and the route by which one could penetrate as far as the lands of the Iroquois.
In Samuel de Champlain's diary entry for July 4th, 1609, it makes its first appearance as a character in the white man's story of discovery.
The Lake was the silent actor in many of man's squabbles, battles at Valcour and Plattsburgh, which today lend names to sailboat races. In the reverie of those who have sailed her waters, in several boats, with many friends, in countless races, the final memories must be of the Lake.
For just a brief tick in time it plays yet another silent scene.
PRELUDE
Sailboating, particularly competitive sailboat activities, is a fairly recent sport on Lake Champlain in the Plattsburgh, New York area. Although yachting for sport has its roots in the early 1800s in America, it was not until after the Second World War that sails became common in Cumberland Bay. There had certainly been a variety of working and fighting sailing vessels in these waters and every local history buff can tell a version of the Battle of Valcour during the Revolutionary War, or of the Battle of Plattsburgh four decades latter.
Given the size and beauty of Lake Champlain, and its suitability for recreational sailing, it is an oddity that yachting activities did not sooner move north from the New York City area where competitive sailing started in the early 1800s and was a common sport early in the last century.
On the Vermont side of the Lake, however, the Lake Champlain Yacht Club celebrated its centennial in 1987 and the Mallett's Bay Boat Club its fiftieth anniversary a year earlier.
LAKE CHAMPLAIN YACHT CLUB
Organized in May of 1887, the Lake Champlain Yacht Club (LCYC) was an outgrowth of the Burlington Sharpie Yacht Club which had formed the previous year. Its first club house was at the foot of College Street in Burlington and was the scene of many colorful regattas over the next forty-eight years.
Motor and sailing yachts from all over New England, New York, and the St. Lawrence River region enjoyed the LCYC facilities there. One of Lake Champlain's earliest sailing trophies, the Ladies' Cup, was first awarded at the LCYC regatta in September of 1888.
In 1936, the LCYC, faced with a deteriorated water-side foundation to its club house, sold its property to the ferry company and sought a new location. Many members at that time wanted to locate to Mallett's Bay but most members wished to remain close to Burlington. Subsequently, the LCYC bought the Allenwood Inn property on Shelburne Bay, almost directly across from the Shelburne Shipyard. In 1938, the LCYC sold that property and rented a camp and the steamer Chateaugay, moored at the foot of King Street.
In 1940, the membership voted to continue the organization, which had been incorporated in 1892, but not to operate a club house. During the forties and fifties, the LCYC was in a period of dormancy but state corporation taxes were paid in order to keep the Lake Champlain Yacht Club alive as a corporate entity.
In December, 1961, the LCYC was given new life when its members bought the parcel of land on Shelburne Bay where it is located today. In 1963, a club house was erected and the Club subsequently saw a tremendous increase in membership and boating activities. [The foregoing is adapted from a brief history of the LCYC appearing in its 1974 Yearbook and written by Anne S. Brown, Log Chairman.]
MALLETT'S BAY BOAT CLUB
When, in 1936, the Lake Champlain Yacht Club of Burlington sold its old club house property, many members wanted to relocate to Malletts Bay north of Winooski, Vermont. At that time, Mallett's Bay opened to a larger outer bay but not to the main part of Lake Champlain. Blocking sailboats with tall masts was the Rutland Railroad causeway from Colchester Point to Allen Point. Today, this only partially remains a barrier since the rail tracks and trestle have long been removed. Formed in 1936 as an offshoot of the LCYC, the Mallett's Bay Boat Club (MBBC) today enjoys one of the most protected moorings on Lake Champlain. Their club house is one of the finest yacht club facilities on the Lake. Ken Wolvington of the MBBC wrote a history of that club during their fiftieth anniversary year.
THE PLATTSBURGH BAY SCENE ca. 1940
In the period just prior to the Second World War, according to the memory of Dr. David B. McDowell, there were only three sailboats in the Plattsburgh area. In the early 1940's he remembers that Doctor Brown had a fairly large cruising sailboat. The Dunn family owned a Comet, a sixteen foot centerboard sloop which design went back to 1932. The third was his own first boat, a homemade sloop that he had purchased in 1941 for seventy-five dollars. It was rare to see a sailboat on Lake Champlain in the vicinity of Plattsburgh at that time. It is probable that there was sailboat racing to the south at the Split Rock Yacht Club at the Crater Club in Essex, New York where there was a fairly active program. And, of course, many traditions involving sailing regattas had been established on the Vermont side of the Lake.
THE PLATTSBURGH YACHT CLUB
Organized shortly after the Second World War, the Plattsburgh Yacht Club (PYC) was based at the Dock and Coal Marina. The clubhouse was located on the south end of the boat yard and provided a focal point for PYC social activities for over a decade. In fact, some former members state that it was "the note", essentially a mortgage to the National Commercial Bank for the clubhouse building, which provided a central theme for the club in its last years. In 1969, the last $225 of that note were paid and the canceled note was burned during a ceremony at the Champagne Rendezvous at Burton Island on July 13th. In latter years, the clubhouse was leased to a commercial proprietor which operated it as a tavern until the end of the 1977 season. Subsequently, according to Dan Riley, former manager of Plattsburgh Harbor Marina, the clubhouse was demolished in the summer of 1981.
William Rowe was the last commodore of the PYC in 1969 and recalls the earlier period just before the Valcour Sailing Club was formed. He remembers starting sailing regattas with a 10-gauge shotgun using live loads because blanks, apparently, were not available. "Maybe that's why the sailors chose to form their own club," he mused, "we shot that gun straight up into the air and the shot would just rain down all around the fleet. I was Commodore of the PYC at that time and when they (sailors) formed a new club, out of loyalty to the PYC, I didn't join at that time." Bill went on to add that some of the most active members in the PYC were sailors and when they formed the Sailing Club, the PYC lost some of its most enthusiastic members. "I guess this has proven out," Bill added, "because today the Valcour Sailing Club is going strong but the PYC has been inactive for quite some time."
In its last active year, the PYC was a group of power boaters with few sailing members. A roster of that year shows these names: William L. Rowe III, Commodore; William Prescott, Vice Commodore; James O'Connor, Treasurer; Catherine Coolidge, Secretary; and the following members: A. Wallace Buck, Louis Wolf, Robert Glenn, George Teichman, Howard Westcott, Rex Lamb, Pepe LeMoko, E.T. Harris, Leonard Epstein, Frank Pabst, Myron Caplan, Charles Payson, Thomas Quinn, Stanley Tuller, Leonard Schlesinger, Dave Tune, John Coolidge, Dr. Francis Baker, Charles Thomas, Archie Burdeau, Robert Ladue, William Caddick, Harvey Yarmus, Maurice Devereaux, Dana Weeks, Charles Thompson, John Kelly, Melvin Titus, David Caplan, H.W. Arthur, Lawrence Carpenter, Francis O'Brien, Anthony Blair, Kenneth Ducatte, Bert Copeland, Louis Kaifetz, Charlie Paepon, Francis O'Brien, and Dr. B. Sheldon Hagar.