George Harding Cuthbertson
George Harding Cuthbertson was a founding partner of Cuthbertson & Cassian yacht designers, one of four companies that in 1969 formed C&C Yachts, a Canadian yacht builder that dominated North American sailing in the 1970s and early ‘80s.
His was the first “C” in C&C, with his design associate George Cassian, being the second. Cuthbertson would go on to be president of that company for many years, establishing plants in Rhode Island and Kiel, Germany, boat production in England and Italy, in addition to their existing Production Plant in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, and Custom Shop in Oakville, ON.
In an article in Maclean's magazine in August 1970 George Cuthbertson was described as six-foot-four, weighing 220 pounds. He has a crewcut, his voice is deep, and he looks like a linebacker on his day off. He also had a couple of nicknames:
When it comes to nicknames, sailing and the yacht business may be even cuter and more prolific than, say, golf and the golf business. Cuthbertson is not only Big George, he's also Cumbersome. Cassian is not only Little George, he's also Casual. Get it? C & C Yachts.
Early life
Cuthbertson was born on June 3, 1929, in Brantford, Ontario. He was the second son of Elma Charlotte, and Allan Edward Cuthbertson, who was general manager and later president of Harding Carpets, which operated a factory in Brantford. George's middle name came from carpet company founder Victor Harding.The elder Mr. Cuthbertson died suddenly of a heart attack in 1943. His widow and sons moved to her hometown of Toronto. There was no yachting background in his family. There had been exposure to boating at summer camps, but it was his enrolment in the Royal Canadian Yacht Club's junior program at 14 and his introduction to the instruction boats, known with dubious affection as "Brutal Beasts", that provided a formal introduction to the sport.
George had an innate feeling for sailing, one that encompassed not only athletics but form and structure. As a boy, he was always drawing airplanes and ships—or rather, translating them, to scale, from imagined solid form to two-dimensional schemes. He was beginning to see beauty, grace and speed as qualities that could be governed by mathematics, albeit a mathematics tempered by artistic instinct. In time, this vision would lead to a career in an occupation with a very narrow membership—that of a Canadian yacht designer with an international reputation.
He had few role models. The level of sailing activity in the Toronto area was a far cry from today's crowded standards. It was very much a male pastime, with the concept of the sport as a truly family recreation still many years away. In the shadow of post-war economic gloom, outings seemed to be restricted to Saturdays on the part of the men of the household, with a few women joining in. There was little regular work to support a full-time resident designer. Apart from a number of enthusiasts like Charlie Burke, who excelled in racing dinghy designs, and a few local builders who, on occasion, penned their own creations, the ranks of full-fledged local designers were
practically empty.
The circle of potential clients and associates was relatively small, and Cuthbertson made many key connections as the Royal Canadian Yacht Club's official measurer, a post he assumed at 17. The job put him in touch with many individuals important to his future, and lent him first-hand experience with the shapes and dimensions of the Great Lakes' faster yachts.
Education
George completed high school in Toronto before earning a degree in mechanical engineering at the University of Toronto, graduating in 1950.Career
After graduating Cuthbertson worked for a time for the Canadian operation of SKF, the Swedish ball-bearing manufacturer. In 1951, he formed a registered partnership with Peter Davidson, a young man also active in sailing at the RCYC, for the purpose of producing products in an experimental new material called fibreglass. This work led to Cuthbertson's first production design, the Water Rat, a small dinghy conceived in 1953. About 80 in all were built, mostly with the bare hands of the two partners. There wasn't a lot of work for yacht design in Canada at that time, so they operated a yacht brokerage, which imported yachts from Europe, under the name of Canadian Northern Co.''Venture II''
Cuthbertson was active in both 6-Metre and 8-Metre competition, which led to an important modification assignment. The RCYC and the Rochester Yacht Club had arranged to revive the Canada's Cup, an emblem of match racing supremacy on the Great Lakes, last contested between the two clubs in 1934, in honour of the RCYC's centennial in 1954. The series was to be sailed, as in the previous outing, in 8-Metres, and Royal Canadian Yacht Club member Norm Walsh hired Cuthbertson to secure a proven 8-Metre and draw up its alterations. After losing the opening race of the match series, Walsh's Venture II, with Cuthbertson and Davidson aboard, won three straight to bring the Canada's Cup to its native land for the first time since 1903. It was an encouraging debut for the 25 year-old Canadian designer, and it paid off with an imagined dividend when Walsh subsequently asked Cuthbertson to provide the design for a large ocean racer.''Inishfree''
Inishfree was George Cuthbertson's first design of consequence and she was built in Meaford, Ontario by Cliff Richardson Boat Works. A year and a half under construction, her materials and workmanship were the finest. Finished bright, she was double planked of mahogany over laminated oak frames, and bronze fastened with cast bronze centreboard in a monel trunk. Her laid deck was of teak, and her mainmast aluminum, but her other spars were of spruce. Inishfree was launched in August, 1958 and sailed from Georgian Bay to Toronto in time to score her first win – the Edward Prince of Wales Cup. In 1960, the RCYC burgee was first flown in a Bermuda Race as Inishfree sailed to a respectable finish in Class B. Returning home, she won the Freeman Cup Race, her first of three in a row – the only yacht ever to so accomplish – and she added a fourth Freeman Cup win in 1964.Many more trophies bear her name. In 1961 alone, Inishfree won the Marlatt and Boswell Trophies, the Cosgrave, Dufferin, Marquis of Lorne and Queen's Cups, her second Freeman Cup and the Rochester Race – her first of three in a row.
Subsequently, owned by W. Bernard Herman of Island Yacht Club, Inishfree became in the early 1960s the first Canadian entrant in the Southern Ocean Racing Circuit, initiating Canadian participation which was to prove historic in years to come. She promptly began to rack up an enviable race record on Lake Ontario.
Canadian Northern Co.
Cuthbertson modified a number of European yachts for the North American market. These Canadian Northern 35s were designed by Cuthbertson and built of steel by Kurt Beister in Norderney, Germany. A half dozen were built by Cliff Richardson in Meaford, Ontario. One, named Carousel was ordered as a bare hull by a boyhood friend of Cuthbertson's from sailing days in Port Credit, who had since become Peter Davidson's brother-in-law. His name was Perry Connolly, and he would soon return to George Cuthbertson for the design that would make both their names household words in international sailing circles."At this time, Ted Brewer was very involved with our brokerage and import activities," Cuthbertson says. "Ted was with us for about three years, functioning as a yacht broker while studying yacht design in his spare time through the Westlawn course. In time, he also moved to the U.S. to take a job with Luders Marine Construction in Stamford, Conn., and so began his distinguished career."
Much had happened in the interim between the 1954 Canada's Cup and the launching of Inishfree. Cuthbertson and Davidson had parted ways, leaving Cuthbertson on his own to pursue further design commissions.
Cuthbertson & Cassian
In 1961 Cuthbertson took George Cassian into the company, and established the design firm of Cuthbertson & Cassian, which designed a number of successful steel, and strip planked wooden boats for Great Lakes and East Coast customers.In an interview Cutbertson explained:
In late ’58 there was a very major plant, Avro up in Malton, Ontario, building aircraft. They had developed the Avro Arrow , which was apparently superb. They built a half-dozen, the customer being the Canadian government. It was generally acknowledged to be the best aircraft of its type—a fighter—in the world at that time. For a variety of reasons that are still hotly debated, the prime minister at that time , John Diefenbaker, canceled the contract. Whoosh! Avro had no choice but to immediately shut down, they were so wedded to that program. Diefenbaker canceled the contract on a Friday and that laid off 17,000 people, including George Cassian, who was in the design department. On Monday this young chap walked into my office and introduced himself. Said we'd met once several years before at a party, which was likely. Was there any chance he could get a job?
He had drawings with him and I was impressed. I said, “George, I have two weeks of design work ahead of me. And if you join, that will be one week each.”
So he said, “Well, I haven't got anything else to do.” So I said, “Okay.” He was with me for almost a year. His other interest was automobiles, racing cars. He decided to move to Detroit in the auto industry, but whenever he was back in Toronto, where his family was, he'd drop in the office to see how things were going. He told me he was moving home and getting married and would like to buy a share of the business. I was up to my ears in debt, having trouble paying bills, so I sold him a 25% interest. We incorporated as Cuthbertson & Cassian Ltd. In due course that 25% was increased to one third. We were never a partnership.
Among the more notable Cuthbertson & Cassian products from the early 1960s were Vanadis, a 34-footer built of steel in Germany for Payson Mayhew of Chicago in 1960, Galatia for Tony Ronza, Sr., Laura for Doug Hood, Courtesan for John Young of Shelter Island, NY, Inferno I for Jim McHugh, La Mouette and Thermopylae for Gordon Fisher, and the little motorsailor Pipe Dream for Sonny Slemin. When Payson Mayhew's Vanadis attended the 1961 Southern Ocean Racing Conference, Cuthbertson was part of her crew. His appearance may have heen the first modern day participation by a Canadian in the circuit, and the experience introduced him to many people who would be influential in the development of C&C.