Thistle History
Early History - Seattle Fleet 61
Fleet 61 was officially chartered in 1964. However, its history starts much earlier. In 1952, George Levin, our "Thistler Emeritus", crewed on a Thistle owned by Howard Springer when in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Howard subsequently towed his boat out here to Seattle with two bare wooden D&M hulls stacked on top – hoping someone would be as excited about the Thistle as he was. He was right. George Levin bought one (#756) and Connie Foltus bought the other (#725). Connie sold his boat to Bruce Whittemore in 1954. Bruce and his boat "Finnegan’s Wake" was the first Thistle registered under the CYC Seattle Flag.
Through the 1950’s and early 1960’s the small group of Thistles sailed under the "Utility" class during CYC racing. Others such as Howard Springer (#583) and Gene Trott (#1070 – Gemini) joined the small, dedicated group. George Levin spotted a lone Thistle (#1371) at a boat works at Seward Park in Seattle and purchased it "just to keep in town". Hull #756 eventually was sold to a skipper to start the Tacoma/Gig Harbor Fleet.
The Fleet 61 really started to take off in 1962 when Bob Alexander came into the picture. George Levin was looking out his window one afternoon and saw a Thistle sailing across Portage Bay. The two hooked up and soon had the fleet up to seven Thistles by 1963. Bruce and George were constantly "on the prowl" to convert sailors from other classes such as Lightning, OK Dinghy, and Penguin to their growing Thistle Fleet. Rumor has it George would often kick his regular crew off the boat to make room for a potential new fleet member. Once they rode on a Thistle – there was no going back.
Fleet 61 was officially chartered with the Thistle Class Association in 1964. Joining the Fleet in 1964 were Bill Randall (#1015 – Iolair), Fred Bassetti (#1203 – Magari) and George Rifkin (1926 – Top Banana). A large boost to the Seattle Fleet growth and West Coast Thistling was the entry of Clark Boat Company of Kent, Washington as a Thistle builder. As there was always a little rivalry between the West Coast and East Coast/Midwest Thistlers it was significant milestone to have our own West Coast builder.
The West Coast Thistling momentum continued to grow as Dennis Clark won the 1968 Thistle National Championship at age 17. The tradition in this era was that the winning skipper’s District would host the next year’s Nationals Regatta. Thus with Dennis’s win, the Thistle Nationals came out west for the first time to Eugene, Oregon in 1969. Dennis continued with top 5 finished in many subsequent Nationals. Fleet 61 continues to produce top placing skippers such as Marty Seelig, Bill Cooke, Joe Burcar, Terry Lettenmaier, Ken Tucker, Wayne Balsiger, Pat Schirmer, Jack Christiansen, Frank Flannery, Alex Kimball and many others.
Moving into the 1970’s and 1980’s Fleet 61 rode the popularity wave of sailing and continued to grow. With dock moorage problems at Leschi, in 1973 the Fleet built the three new floats in conjunction with the Snipe and Flying Dutchman fleets. These floats are still being used at Leschi today.
After the Clark Boat Company stopped building Thistles in the late 70’s, three members of Fleet 61 (Jack Wolfe, Bill Cooke, and Denny Skoglund) started as "First to the Mark Boat Company" building from the Clark mold. Other Northwest builders (Chris Spens, Dan Winchester, and Dave Sexton with Northwest One Design) continued to keep Thistle building in the Northwest. However, at this time there is currently not a builder for Thistles in the Northwest.
What is evident throughout Fleet 61’s history is not only its top sailors but also a heritage of being family oriented, fun and extremely helpful to new members. Fleet 61 is still one of the largest fleets in the United States and continues the tradition of fun and fast Thistle sailing.