09/19/2024
Revitalizing a classic one-design
If you’ve spent time in Penobscot Bay, you’re likely familiar with the Dark Harbor 20, a 30-foot LOA one-design classic sloop designed by Olin Stephens in 1934. Most of the 21 plank-on-frame wooden DH20s built in the early 1900s still exist and actively compete in Tarratine Yacht Club races off Islesboro’s Dark Harbor. The crew at Lyman-Morse’s Thomaston yard is helping continue the classic design’s sailing legacy, with the construction of two fiberglass Dark Harbor 20s.
“They are nimble, exciting to race,” Stephens noted back in the day about the design. “Displacement is light, and the hull easily driven…The boats are also attractive in appearance, as would be expected of a class sailed in this stylish and long-established enclave.”
The two boats, built at Lyman-Morse Boatbuilding and finished by Pendleton Yacht Yard, were scheduled for a summer launch.
Photo courtesy Lyman-Morse- Two fiberglass Dark Harbor 20 hulls came out of the Lyman-Morse shop in the spring of 2024.
