This discussion, drawing on
material in Henderson's book, will emphasize his
designs of racing cruising sailboats from roughly
the 1930's through the 1960's in the 25-65 foot
range. His boats in this range won numerous ocean
races (Bermuda, Trans-Atlantic) and short races
and cruised successfully on lakes, coasts, and
oceans. They have high, nicely curved bows, well
defined sheers dropping fairly low in the
mid-ships to after third, and rising gracefully
to a buoyant stern. The profiles of the boats
are distinctive and similar enough to be big and
little sister ships. By today's standards, the
hulls are relatively narrow and heavy, resulting
in a more comfortable motion in a seaway than the
light, wide, high modern boats. Rhodes' boats
have a good turn of speed, easily reaching their
hull speeds with modest breezes.
While the boats are quite similar
in profile, the Rhodes boats are different. With
a great deal of oversimplification, overlooking
questions of displacement, keel shape, and rig,
the boats fall into five groups:
1. Rhodes' basic hull form was
remarkably stable from the late 1920's to the
early 1960s. It was a fairly narrow hull, with
the lwl roughly 2.7 to 3 times the beam. (The
bigger boats in this series generally are
relatively narrower, gaining stability from
greater weight.). The Rhodes 27
designed in 1938 had a beam of 9'8" for a 27
foot waterline. Caper, one of Rhodes'
favorite boats, was only 12' wide for a lwl of
38' (and a loa of 56'). In the smaller size
boats, this hull form is seen in the Ranger
and Chesapeake 32. (green marks on the
chart)
2. Rhodes designed a few boats
that were quite a bit narrower, mainly for
inland lake racing, day sailing, and overnight
cruising. The Great Lakes 30 was a
little over 29' on the water line but only 7'9"
in beam. The Rhodes 33, developed for
Southern California, falls in this group. (red
marks on the chart)
3. Rhodes also designed a series
of centerboarders with somewhat more beam than
his standard hull form. Generally the lwl was
2.5 to 2.8 times the beam. This model was well
defined with Ayesha (1932) and refined in
Alondra (1936). The model had enough of
a keel for ocean-going stability, but still were
shoal draft boats. Alondra played a key
role in popularizing the keel-centerboard
concept in a strange way. Alondra was purchased
by Carleton Mitchell in 1947 and renamed
Caribbee. She was raced very successfully
and cruised extensively. For a variety of
reasons, more related to racing and rigging than
hull form, Mitchell went to Sparkman and
Stephens for his next boat, Finisterre.
Olin Stephens based Finisterre's
centerboard hull very much on the Rhodes
Alondra model that had so satisfied
Mitchell.
Rhodes developed the centerboard
in a full range of sizes. Perhaps the most
famous in this series was Carina II, with
a waterline of 36'3", 2.79 times its 13' beam.
A smaller version of Carina II was Design
No. 618, with a water line of 32' and beam of
11'9', for a ratio of 2.72. Several boats were
built to this design. Rhodes carried this
theme to Erewhon, with a 29' waterline
and 11'3" beam. In fiberglass, the Swiftsure
was an even smaller version of the Rhodes
centerboarder concept. Swiftsure had a
waterline of 22'11" and a beam of 10'. These
beamier boats were not fat. On a 29 foot water
line, Rhodes gave the narrow version (Altair)
a 10'6" beam; the centerboarder (Erewhon)
had a beam of 11'3", just 9 inches more.
(purple marks on the chart)
4. Over the years and decades,
Rhodes seemed to give boats slightly more beam,
an inch or two here or there. By the 1960's, he
had a boat that might be considered a new
design. It was noticeably beamier than his
earlier models, but not quite as beamy as the
centerboarders. The Rhodes Reliant,
designed in 1963, defined this new, "medium"
model. The gradual increase in the beam for
the Reliant can be seen in his evolution
of the 28' waterline. In the 1930s, Rhodes
gave a 28' waterline boat a 9'8" beam on
Surf Bird and a 9'10" beam on a Rhodes
Cutter; Bounty II had a beam of 10'3"
(in 1956); Copacetic in 1962 had 10'6"
beam. The Reliant, in 1963, had a 10'9" beam.
This medium hull form also was evident in the
smaller Vanguard. (blue marks on the
chart)
5. Another, quite different
design breakthrough of Rhodes was the large,
full powered, cruising, centerboard ketch, made
of steel. These vessels are in the 60' to 100'
range. Drawing only 5 to 6 1/2 feet, they can
get into shallow habors but are secure in ocean
passages. Needless to say, they have very
comfortable accomodations. The first of these
boats was Tamaris (1937). After the War Rhodes
designed a 77 footer, and then both smaller and
larger vessels of this concept, some with twin
screws. In the "Classic Resotrations" portion of
this website, this design is illustrated by:
Tamaris (design #423)
Kanaloa (design #712)
Rainbow (design #744)
Cacilque (design #785)
From today's perspective, it seems
strange that almost none of Rhodes' designs, not
even the largest sail and motor yachts, has a
double bed! No matter how large and elegant the
cabins, even if they were double cabins, they had
two (distantly) separated beds, and not very wide
at that. On the boats in the 70 to 100+ foot
range, there is room for a bath tub in the owner's
cabin and two narrow bunks almost 20 feet apart!
On Copperhead, he came close to having a
near double bed, but deliberately made it narrower
and put in a "stowage bin" instead. Obviously the
constraint was not space. According to Charles
Jannace, the reason for no double beds was simple:
clients didn't ask for them. In those days, among
his clients, a yacht seems to have been more for
racing and adventure at sea. It wasn't the place
for family togetherness or sexual exploits.
Rhodes designed boats for sailing, with narrow,
secure beds at sea. His clients had other places
for their families and rendezvous.
Rhodes did put in a double bed in
a few boats as part of a distinctive inerior, with
a linear galley to starboard and a dinette to port
in which the table can drop down and form a double
bed. This design first shows up in Olsching
and some of her sisterships including Piera
and Masker (design 618) built in 1953-56
and later in Firande, 1957 (design 666).
This inteior enabled the Reliant, 1963 (design
753), to have three separate cabins and a
double bed. This same idea of dinette to port and
linear galley to starboard is carried into the 45'
cruising ketch Meltemi (designed the year
after the Reliant) and the micro cruiser, the
Rhodes 22, which also has a small dinette/double
bed to port and a galley to starboard. Design
#618,also, has a double bed in the tiny fore peak.
While the large ocean racers
captured headlines, Rhodes designed several small
day sailers, which have captured thousands of
sailors for generations. The 11 1/2' Penguin,
designed in 1933, remains a vigorous class today.
Close to 10,000 have been built. Perhaps the most
popular was the Rhodes 19, designed in 1945, with
either a centerboard or fin keel. About 3,200
have been built, and they are actively raced in 16
fleets around the United States.
Rhodes was one of the pioneers in
the transition to fiberglass construction. He
adapted his classic designs and designed Bounty
II for Coleman Plastics in 1956. This boat
was the first large production sailboat out of
fiberglass, and established the viability of
fiberglass as a material for large production
boats. (The molds were later bought by Pearson and
the boat became the R41.) Over the next four
years, the Rhodes office designed five boats for
Seafarer Yachts, at that time based in
Holland. These were the Swiftsure (33'
centerboarder, 1958), a 35' motor sailor (1959),
Ranger (28', 1959), Meridian (24',
1961), and a sailing dinghy (7', 1961). He also
designed the Chesapeake 32 (1958, built in
Denmark). In 1963, he designed several fiberglass
boats; Vanguard (33' for Pearson),
Reliant (41' for Cheoy Lee), and Tempest
and Outlaw (23' and 26' for O'Day). These
boats are in remarkably good structural condition
even today. Many have been restored, and the ones
that have not are good candidates for such
treatment. They are examples not only of Rhodes'
overall design, but also of his early mastery of
the new fiberglass material.
The Reliant project brought
some stress. Cheoy Lee made a knock-off from the
Rhodes design, marketed as the Offshore 40,
and refused to pay design royalties to Rhodes.
Perhaps this soured Rhodes on fiberglass mass
production; he did not provide any other designs
for fiberglass production classes. Thus the
Bounty II-R41-Reliant were his largest mass
produced fiberglass boat.
The early Rhodes boats had very
simple (and light) mechanical systems. They used
kerosene lamps and rudimentary plumbing. As the
decades went by, all the systems and equipment on
the boats became more elaborate and heavier, but
the hull remained rather static, without
additional bouyancy. The boats set deeper and
deeper on their waterlines.
By the 1950's, Philip Rhodes was
was not actually designing, but was overseeing a
large firm, meeting clients and developing
contracts for various projects. In the sailboat
portion of the office, James McCurdy, a very
talented designer, served as head of the Yacht
Design Section. The actual designs of boats
followed certain formula and guidelines Rhodes had
developed earlier. Much of the basic design work
was done by his son Philip H. ("Bodie") Rhodes (link
to Bodie Rhodes obituary). Detailed layouts
and drawings were done by Al Mason, Charles
Jannace, and Dick Davis. Other designers worked
on motor yachts, and commercial and military
boats. In addition, Rhodes' other son Daniel
Rhodes did brokerage work in the office.
Philip Rhodes formally retired in
1970, after 50 years of work. Even in retirement,
he remained tied to his work. In his
correspondence with an owner in late September,
1973, he was gracious and attentive. He wrote,
"I would like to know where you are going to keep
the boat and whether or not you are going to
retain the name. I try awfully hard to keep in
touch with my owners. There are a few more
weekends left this season and I hope you will be
able to take advantage of them." When the owners
replied to him, Rhodes wrote, "I cannot remember
ever receiving a more pleasant, enjoyable and
informative and welcome letter as yours of October
4. You certainly brought me up-to-date on a great
many things that are always of interest to a
designer who wants to know who is sailing his
boats, and far more of the owner's background than
one usually gets... I hope that you achieve those
plans and eventually take that trip around the
world. One of our boats of the same waterline
length is now being prepared for such a trip and
I know that she will be a very good boat for it.
We have had several larger boats make the voyage
and it must be a great experience....It has been a
pleasure ot write you this letter and to tell you
about the good ship but I want to conclude by
telling you once again how much I appreciate all
the nice things you had to say about her. Anytime
I can be of help, please let me know."
Interspersed between these gracious words were
suggestions on controlling rust, minimizing
electrolysis, trim and ballast, coupled with a
detailed explanation of the relationship between
length and displacement.
Philip L. Rhodes died in 1974.
Before Rhodes retired in 1970, he
began to phase out his office in the late 1960s.
In 1968, Jim McCurdy and his son Bodie Rhodes left
to set up a their own yacht design company
(McCurdy and Rhodes). Mark Ellis came into the
gap and worked for Philip Rhodes for a year.
McCurdy and Rhodes, among other things, continued
the Rhodes design work for Seafarer Yachts. Jim
McCurdy died in 1996, and Bodie Rhodes died in
1998. Jim's son Ian McCurdy continues the family
tradition in boat design.
While this review has emphasized
Rhodes' racing/cruising sailboats, he designed
many other types of boats and hull forms. There
are lighter displacement fin keel sailboats, very
large cruising ketches, motorsailers, medium and
high speed motorboats, racing hydrofoils, etc.
According to Henderson, during World War II, he
had responsibilities for Navy auxiliaries, patrol
craft, minelayers,
minesweepers (including the basic hull for the 172
foot MineSweeper Ocean (MSO) in the early 1950s
--
profile plan), school ships, salvage vessels,
tugs, barges, and subchasers. He supervised
conversion of large liners into troopships and
worked on hospital ships. Later he worked on a
large line of cargo vessels, fire boats, dredges,
steam turbo-propelled vessels for the Yangtze
River, etc. A significant portion of the firm's
income came from contracts with the City of New
York to design police boats, garbage and sewage
barges, etc. Rhodes designed a 53 foot
patrol/rescue launch for the New York City police
in the 1960s. One
of them has recently been lovingly and beautifully
restored and is again saving lives. The
Rhodes 22 trailorable cruiser doesn't look like a
classic Rhodes boat, but somewhere in his vast
array of projects, I am sure its antecedents could
be discovered.
How did Rhodes conduct business
and earn a living? In 1956, an Australian
negotiated with Rhodes about building one of his
designs. The correspondence is available and
describes some of the business practices of
Rhodes. Typically, at this time (1956) the fees
for the naval architect were 10 percent of the
completed cost of the boat. A designer would know
this price if he could supervise the
construction. The cost of construction in places
outside the USA was less (e.g. Aberking and
Rassmussen in Germany), so Rhodes asked more,
12.5%, of the completed construction cost for
boats built outside the USA. Philip Rhodes didn't
know the costs in Australia, so there were some
quotes prepared that must have been sent to
Rhodes. In the end he suggested buying a
completed design (#618) rather than a new
commission for a 5% rate of the USA building cost
- the same price to buy these plans in the USA.
Rhodes at one time or other
employed (and certainly influenced) many naval
architects who are well known, including Bob
Wallstrom, Olin Stephens, Joseph Reinhardt, James
McCurdy, Charles Wittholz, Al Mason, Robert
Steward, William Tripp, Frederick Bates, Ralph
Jackson, Francis Kinney, Richard Davis, Henry
Devereaux, Winthrop Warner, Charles Jannace, and
Mark Ellis. Weston Farmer was an associate, and
considered Rhodes to be one of the greatest
artists who ever lived.
Excerpts on the Tempest
and Outlaw Class from Richard Henderson's 1993
Book - Philip L. Rhodes and His Yacht
Designs
