Here’s another vintage ice boat newsreel from British Pathé, the 1956 Northwest Regatta sailed on Geneva Lake.
Read about the regatta in this Oshkosh Daily Northwestern newspaper report from January 23, 1956.
Since we’re on the subject of the Northwest, this is a good opportunity to note that there’s a new webpage dedicated to the regatta with up to date By Laws, Sailing Instructions, Records of Regatta Winners, and Northwest Archives. Many thanks to SIBC’s Steve Schalk for helping to organize the page.
From left- John Jacobs Sr., Bill Sarns, Skip Boston, and Elmer Millenbach, probably at a Detroit Ice Yacht Club banquet, c early 1950s
1954 Northwest
1954 marked the first time that the DN class competed in the Northwest and Skip Boston won that inaugural DN title. It was also a year that competitors completed the regatta despite tough conditions that ranged from no wind, 40 mph wind, followed by single digit temperatures. The regatta was scheduled for Pewaukee on January 15-71, 1954. The regatta’s opening day was a wash because the wind never materialized. On Saturday, “high winds, blowing snow, and poor visibility hampered racing…but good ice and 40 mph winds prevailed,” according to the Wisconsin State Journal. [40 miles per hour winds, really?-ed.]
The off season is the best time for this website to catch up on posting iceboating history. Jane Pegel recently sent a magazine page from 1951 Click here to see article.about the Northwest which motivated me to chose that historic regatta as the focus of TBT. Next week, we’ll start at the beginning.
The 1951 Northwest was sailed on Gull Lake in Michigan. The Mary B won the A stern steerer division. That was the third year in a row she won the Northwest and she would go on to win in 1952 and 1953.
The newspaper accounts are full of interesting details, such as the Mary B costing $24,000 to build. (Right click on the newspaper articles to open them in a new tab if you’d like to take a closer look at them.)
Class A:Mary B, O.T.Havey, Owner; Carl Bernard, Skipper.
Class B: Miss Jane II, Dan Coffey Jr., Einar Brink
Class C: Susan Jo, Lambert, Stroshine, Dick Heumueller
Class D: Rosemary II, Don Ward
Free For All: Renegade, Skeeter E Class, Elmer Millenbach Detroit, Mi.
I came across these photos while searching through the Life Magazine photo archives for the 1962 issue with a Pewaukee Skeeter on the cover. It brought me back to a few weeks ago, sitting on Bill and Mauretta Mattison’s lake side porch with a group of old friends who gathered to reminisce about the stern steerers MENACE, MARY B, and Madison iceboating history. Bill shared the story of the time he crewed for Jim Lunder on FRITZ at the 1948 Northwest and how they won the regatta. The last A stern steerer race was sailed in dimming light at the end of the day. During the race, Bill and Jim sailed into Williams Bay which was not a good place to be sailing an iceboat in near darkness because at that time, ice was harvested there and slabs of ice were piled all over the bay. With a lot of luck, Jim Lunder piloted the FRITZ around the ice blocks without hitting them and made it to the finish line in the darkness. Life’s photos from that regatta are posted here. Northwest regatta winners posted here.
A55 is an A Class Stern-Steer TAKU, currently owned by the Schloemer family in Lake Geneva, WI
1947 Northwest: Post WW2 Boom Years Begin
After a 5 year hiatus because of World War 2, the first post-war Northwest was held at Oshkosh in 1947. 4LIYC’s FRITZ (with new owners, the Lunder brothers and Carl Bernard at the helm) won the A stern steerer trophy. Ed Rollberg, who would go on to bring the Ice Yacht Challenge Pennant to the midwest a few years later, won the E Skeeter title. Iceboaters who served in WW2 came back with new ideas about boat building, particularly the great Elmer Millenbach. More about Elmer next time.
Shortly before the 1947 Northwest, Eastern iceboater, Ray Ruge, wrote an in depth article in Yachting Magazine about the state of iceboating in North America. Read it here.
The 1942 Northwest was sailed in Menominee, Michigan just 6 weeks after the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor and would be the last one sailed until 1947. Neenah Ice Yacht Club’s Jim Kimberly won the E Skeeter title in PHANTOM II. There was no entry in the A fleet that year. The “queen of the ice lanes”, FRITZ, stayed on her home ice that season. (Read more about FRITZ coming out of “exile” here.) In fact no 4LIYC skippers competed in the Northwest that year. Here’s a Capital Times article detailing the winners of the regatta.
