The Beginnings of the Australian A Class.

  The A class rule was designed by Major Heckstall – Smith, Editor of the Yachting Monthly Magazine in England in 1927.

 The A class rule is set up around the premises of; for a given waterline length there is a given sail area. The rule is formulated to come out at 39.37” or I metre. Of course it is more complicated than that but this will probably do to tell the story of A Class in Australia. I don’t want to dwell on the mechanics of the actual rule.

 It is believed the class first started in Australia, around the time that Donald Mc Pherson arrived here from Scotland and landed in Melbourne. Donald had been a Scottish Champion since 1924 in the 6 metre class. The 6 metre is like a smaller version of an A class. He had brought his 6 metre from Scotland when he migrated and quickly got into the new A class racing in the Melbourne Model Yacht Club sailing in Albert Park.( # note. This club, the MMYC was not called the Albert Park Club). Donald was a Cabinet maker and found work in the Myers department store, making furniture.

 Quickly the club bought 4 or 5 A class boats from England and stored them in the old boat club premises in Albert Park in 1929. Donald entered  his A Class “Wee Egg” boat in the British Championships in 1932. And again in the 1948 for the racing “Spur” in the All Nations Race. (The year the American’s won the YACHTING MONTHLY CUP off England, for this was the American’s first time of winning the Cup). Donald was running 4^th when he got sick and had to retire.

 Whilst all this fervour was going on somebody else in Sydney was also designing A class. In one, V.R Blacket in the upper North Shore in Dee Why. We have this interesting photo of him in 1938, with his boat (Serene) running down wind with his cotton spinnaker flying. Now I was lucky in that I managed to find a plan of this particular Sydney boat. Another good thing about this plan is it is worked out as an A class, a X class and a 6 metre on the same drawing. This V. R Blacket was also a Scotsman. He started the NSW Model Yacht club (circa 1935) with an earlier class, the Australian ‘B’  and it was built around a modification of the A class formula.

 In the early days, Australia raced internationally under a Brittish Commonwealth arrangement, for we were considered to be part of the Empire and a colonial part of Britain. Australia did not have its own National Association till as late as 1964, some 16 years later.

 After we became a National Association, the A class started slowly to get some good designers, including Doug Billing, Ron Dunster,

Adrian Brewer and Les Hall in the early days.

 There were some English designs in Adelaide and an early F/G mould of a Highlander by Dick Priest owned by, (I believe) Fred Aimes. This particular design held the Vane speed record for the fastest run down wind (if memory serves me right) of 11. 87 knots.

Two of these Highlanders under R/C in 1969, held an informal match race in the lake during the lunch break of the Marblehead Vane Championships in Canberra. This was my first glimpse of Radio Control yacht racing in Australia by Bob Close and John Summerfield of the Sydney Model Yacht Club.

 The biggest A class I ever saw was the Kubernetes, a Lewis design, 87” long, Lwl 60” displacement of 79.36 lbs (36 kgs) sailed by John Polsnits of the Bayside Model Yacht Club in Adelaide. The smallest, the Zippar-dee-do dah by Adrian Brewer. 27lbs (12 kgs) .  Some of the designs I remember in the early days were: Moonshines by Lewis, Kia Kias by Billing, High landers by Priest, Huron by Dunster and Cougars by Brewer, Radar by Witty and there were others.

And the class settled down to a good future.