Yacht designers gone to war in WWI or WWII?

[cluttonfred]

I came across this apparently unbuilt 1943 light patrol boat design by American yacht designer William Atkin. William began designing boats back in the 1900s and was joined and eventually succeeded by son John. The Atkins are basically legends as 20th century designers of pleasure and utility craft, power and sail, almost always of wood. Between them, they were responsible for 873 designs over 80 years (see The Sea Remains the Same) but I don't know of any other military Atkin designs. Clearly the 40' 2" "Friar Tuck" is no warship, but it is a simple, seaworthy, patrol boat of non-strategic materials and would likely have served well for basic inshore duties.

Designer's description: http://atkinboatplans.com/Cruisers/FriarTuck.html
Original 1943 Motorboating magazine article: https://books.google.com.tr/books?id=snrOMFbb-JYC&lpg=PA44&pg=PA44#v=onepage&q&f=false

Does anyone know of any other examples of yacht designers who designed military craft (built or unbuilt) for the WWI or WWII war efforts? I don't mean civilian shipyards and boatyards that turned to war production, but rather pleasure boat designers that turned they hands to more aggressive products to support the war effort on any side of the conflicts.

Cheers,

Matthew

 

[TomS]

Just a couple at random

Stephens Brothers Boat Builders

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephens_Bros._Boat_Builders

I believe their Air-Sea Launches were their own designs, within a BuShips spec.

Hinckley Yachts too:

http://www.shipbuildinghistory.com/shipyards/yachtlarge/hinckley.htm

 

[Graham1973]

Was looking through the William Atkin website and found something else, not a warship, but a clear case of 'they also serve'.

Designers description: http://atkinboatplans.com/Misc/HenryJohnsonJames.html

 

[phil gollin]

.

The most obvious example is the very famous Uffa Fox and the airborne lifeboats ;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airborne_lifeboat

.

 

[Schneiderman]

In Britain in WW1 several went into the design of flying boat hulls, most notably Linton Hope.

 

[covert_shores]

Among the most interesting will be the GIMIK and SKIFF projects for OSS and CIA respectively. A famous boat builder built them in secret. Old article which partially covers the topic http://covertshores.blogspot.com/2010/07/lost-in-plain-sight-gimik-and-oss_19.html

There is much more uncovered since that article. The GIMIK preserved at the Battleship Cove museum in Massachusetts is well worth a visit of you pass that way (and all the other stuff there!!!!). We owe a debt to a couple of guys, ex-naval officer and submariner Jim Anderson and Dirk Smith, the son of one of the CIA managers involved, otherwise it's be more or less forgotten and misunderstood forever. Will check my files to see what I can share (a fresh Covert Shores article is long overdue).

 

[Temistocle]

BTW, there is an interesting article about GIMIK and SKIFF on the CIA's Study of Intelligence, Vol. 58 No. 4 (December 2014). This is the link:

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol-58-no-4/gimik-and-skiff-a-tale-of-two-semi-submersible-submarines.html

 

[cluttonfred]

Thanks, all, for the posts. Please keep in mind that this is a thread about yacht designers who turned their hand to designing military craft, not the boatyards that built pleasure craft and then switched to military production. Sometimes the designers and the boatyards go hand in hand, but often they do not.

 

[Schneiderman]

Charles Nicholson, of Camper and Nicholson, was another designer involved in flying boat hull construction in WW1

 

[CNH]

Neville Holt.

 

[covert_shores]

Thanks, all, for the posts. Please keep in mind that this is a thread about yacht designers who turned their hand to designing military craft, not the boatyards that built pleasure craft and then switched to military production. Sometimes the designers and the boatyards go hand in hand, but often they do not.

GIMIK and SKIFF are in this category I believe.

 

[Temistocle]

Some other info on Gimik

THE STRANGER-THAN-FICTION CAREER OF THE OSS’S CARL EIFLER