Sailing Magazine
by Richard Crockett
Old salts from days of yore will remember the Sharpie dinghy fondly and reminisce about those glory days of sailing given half a chance.
For the uninitiated the Sharpie is a hard-chined, flat bottom dinghy with an extremely shallow draft and straight flaring sides developed in the 1930s. The original boats were built from mahogany planks on oak frames, so were heavy and cumbersome.
In 1966 SAYRA approved new rules to allow the class to be built in plywood and to generally rationalise a design which had contributed so much to South African yacht racing.
Are there any Sharpies still sailing in this country?
And as a bonus there three captioned photos of the South African State President, Mr CR Swart, going sailing off Durban.
READ MORE HERE: 1966 08 – SA Yachting – plywood sharpies – 0OCR
