As the Dutch found dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht had been a leisure craft used first by royalty and secondly by the burghers for the canals as well as the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, coming out of private games. English yachting began with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his return to the English monarchy in 1660, the city of Amsterdam sent him a 20-metre (66-foot) leisure boat with a beam (maximum width) of 5.6 m (18 feet), which he named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, ruled 1685–88), made more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and returning, on a £100 bet. Yachting was found to be popular for the rich and royalty, but after that period the habit did not last.

The first yacht association in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed at about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, with large naval panoply and gravity. The closest thing to racing boats was the “chase,” for which the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club endured, largely as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, after joining with other organisations, it was known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

Yacht racing began in some stipulated method on the Thames in the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV rose to the throne in 1820, it was called the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing dispute, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht association had been initiated at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal funding made the Solent – the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight – the perpetual setting of British yachting. The society at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, again at the ascension of George IV. Each member was required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for great stakes were held, and the social life was superlative. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to bigger than 350 tons.

In North America, yachting was first accomplished with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and continued when the English held control. Sailing was for the most part for pleasure and reached its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which cruised on the Mediterranean Sea and created a minimum of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht association, the Detroit Boat Club, was instigated in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens began the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats
Early sailing yachts were within the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century through to the later half of the 19th century. The design of sizeable yachts was originally largely affected by the success of America, which was created by George Steers for a association led by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) was named after its victory at Cowes in 1851. Earlier yachts were not designed and manufactured in today’s sense, with merely a model being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come into being. Not until the 1920s did the use of the research of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what such science had earlier done for hulls.

Because nearly all sailboats had to be individually built, there came a need for handicapping boats as this was previous to the one-design class boats were designed. Thus, a rating rule came into being, which is found in the International Rule, adopted in 1906 and revised in 1919. Today, one of the rapidly flourishing areas in the sailing industry is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are built to standard dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other aspects (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing for these boats can be done on an even basis with no handicapping necessary. A perfect example is the standard International America’s Cup Class taken on board for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.

As long as yachting belonged mostly for the aristocracy and the affluent, money was no problem, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The promotion and popularity of smaller yachts happened in the later half of the 19th century out of the sailing of the Englishmen R.T. McMullen, a stockbroker, and E.F. Knight, a barrister and journalist. A trip around the world (1895–98) captained single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray proved the hardiness of small boats. Following this in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure boats became more common, down to the dinghy, a favoured training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, boats of less than 3 m were traveled in single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.

Kinds of power yachts
Post the decade 1840–50, in which steam was set to replace sail power in commercial craft, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were used increasingly in pleasure boats. Large power yachts were progressed to a high standard, and long-distance travel was a favourite pastime of the wealthy. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave way to those powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries with both sail and power were the yacht standard for many years. By the second half of the 20th century, several yachts were still auxiliaries, but the large part were solely power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.

In the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the construction of large steam yachts. Conspicuous within these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, with triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was sailed by a crew of over 150. The Mayflower, commissioned by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and gave active service in World War II.

As larger and better quality internal-combustion engines were created, many large boats were using them for power. The establishment of the diesel engine, using heavy oil for fuel, was furthered from World War I. In the decade after that, large power-yacht creation grew, reaching a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. During that period the best auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.

The construction of big power yachts declined after 1932, and the fashion from then was toward smaller, less expensive boats. After World War II, lots of small naval vessels were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. By the late 20th century, yachting has become a globally beloved sport enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen personally sailing and keeping their own small pleasure craft. The popularity of craft and owners is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional areas by the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.

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