I’m a newer boater and last year we bought an ‘86 Chris Craft 381 and love the room for my family. We put about 55 hours on it last summer around Lake Michigan & St. Joe.
Visited a boatyard near Minneapolis that specialized in restoring classic Chris-Craft boats. they had a beautiful '30s boat with a WWI Liberty V-12 for power. Now that was a powerboat! The mechanic stated the Libertys were very smooth running engines when properly tuned.
Back in the 60’s my dad used to take me fishing to Lake Geneva in Wisconsin. The lake was loaded with wood Chris Crafts. I never cared if we caught anything because this 10 year old was always in awe seeing these beautiful boats and hearing their powerful sounding engines. They didn’t go fast so all the better for me.
In the very early sixties my family had a 1955 Chris Craft 16' 4 cylinder two bench seats. Such a beautiful boat. Throttle lever in the center of the steering wheel.
I have a 2015 launch 27! my neighbours have a restored 1940s Christ craft mahogany boat and it’s gorgeous. We have old posters for chris craft and blueprints of their wooden boats framed in our lake house tho, the Chris craft brand means a lot to my family, it’s basically a tradition lol.
My grandfather worked for Chris-Craft for most of his life. He worked in the Caruthersville, Missouri plant and then later moved his family to Salisbury, Maryland when Chris-Craft opened the plant there. For a number of years the Salisbury plant was the largest and most modern boat building factory in the world. My father also worked in the Salisbury plant for a time as well. He hooked up instrumentation and associated wiring between the engines and controls, while my grandfather worked in the hull dept.
enjoyed the video, tho you did not show any of the larger Chris-Craft boats! Grampa had a 1955 42' Chris Craft Sea Cloud, (with the classic bull nose) we grew up on, Chris-Craft is the gold standard of boats and you missed showing most of the these timeless beauties.
my friend Dave works at one if not the first dealership for Chris -Caft at Gregory's Marina in Detroit on the river they have an actual rail road track in the water to being the boats out-of rhe water up to 75 foot long !
I just bought a 1971 31 foot Chris Craft looking for a lot of enjoyment for me and my family she has been stored for 20 years only been on the water for two like new got a great deal on it and I know she is a good boat
On Lake Erie many bootleggers used Chris Craft boats, there was a guy in Windsor that had a huge one and dug out side of shoreline and hid 20 feet of the boathouse under the lawn. LOL!
Gene Eckfield, my grandfather, was VP of Engineering during the later wooden boat years for Chris Craft. He retired as fiber glass was taking over, when the art of wood craftmanship was replaced with new technology. He began his career in Algonac, working with Chris Smith and his sons. Chris used to hand carve his boat designs in small scale. My father Chuck Eckfield also remembered the duck hunting. Wonderful stories from the past!
I can't understand why when you talk about the Chris Craft History there is no mention of GREW! I can distinctly remember seeing old 50's era cabin cruisers which bared the name Grew Chris Craft. What is that all about?
when I was a little boy Mother and Daddy bought a new Chris Craft out of Salt Air in Miami Beach it was a roamer or was it a constellation I think it was a constellation that boat li we had many many fun times in that boat I miss our boat but hopefully she's on the sea somewhere
@@J_M3444 Yes. "Made in Switzerland" cannot be topped, in watches, weapons, mechanical engineering! The Swiss product philosophy is: "The best or nothing"! In U.S.-America, on the other hand, products are manufactured with a built-in obsolescence.
Back in the early 60's, my family owned a 19' Chris, that we completely revarnished, inside and out, and added a layer of fiberglass below the waterline. We had the engine, a 6 cylinder Gray-Marine of about 475 cubic inches, also rebuilt. White button tuck upholstery was going back into it. Taking the boat up to Santa Monica, the trailer detached from the truck. The boat and trailer went into a concrete storm drain. The engine ripped loose, crashed through the bow and left a huge hole. We sold the hole mess to a guy cheap, who wanted the engine, which was undamaged.
I have never gotten any argument about this - so here goes - The 1957 38 foot Constellation we had (and I had to varnish so many times) was/is the most beautiful wooden power boat ever made. I sure miss it now, yet it looks to have gone to LA and was seen in a few TV commercials; still named after me and my brother & sister "Timarlin".
Great video - My mom Regina Berger when she was a teenage in Algonac, Michigan in the 1940's watched Chris Smith's grand kids - Bernard & Neil Smith. Their father also worked at the Chris Craft factory in Algonac. Chris Smith who was a duck hunter and made his own boats made some really neat wood fast boats. They just glided on the water too! Tony Trotta
Our 1947 SwissCraft ZWASLI is just a copy of CrisCraft 👍 It is powered with an OSCO Flathead V8 of 100hp. It has the absolut the best sound of all boats on the lake Zürich!
Grew up on these boats. 42 foot back in the 60s trickling then a 58 foot Romer aluminum hull. Twin Detroit 671s flybrige awesome boat. Best childhood a boy could have. Kept in South Jersey shore
for most of us old blokes we remember the times a speed boat was called a Chris Craft n not just in America, first time i saw a Christ Craft was in Greece in 1959 n i thought then oh my God this is Not just a boat this is art on the water, so really he should be called the father of speed boats the world over thanks to him we now all have the chance to enjoy the water at its best
This video sure breezed over the 1960's quickly, when Chris Craft was the dominant builder of boats . . . in wood, fiberglass, steel and aluminium. Runabouts to 60 foot plus yachts. Regrettably, the brand started to fade rather rapidly in the 70's. Conglomerate ownership and lack of innovation took hold, not a lot different from the fate of OMC. Both companies lost their high status from the 60's. The cycle of corporations, from the top of the hill to the bottom, be it Sears, Kodak, Pan American, or a host of others
My Mother’s first cousin Rex Heideman was a VP of Chris Craft stationed at Chattanooga Tennessee ( sales division, I think ). He was from the Peck , Michigan area.
Thanks. I guess fiberglass is king at the end of the day. Interestingly enough is that there are a few that still build these old styled woodies like Van Dam and a few others and you can clearly see how the way they build them today is far superior to the way they did back then with the added layers of resin and fiberglass inside the wooden hulls to prevent that eventual leaking for the wood expanding and contracting or whatever.
GoMiGman Chris Craft Craft was actually one of the last companies to switch over to fiberglass by 72 pretty much everybody else stopped wood boat production
Interesting, I see a lot of fiberglass boats built with a balsa core and a lot of modern-day woodies built with African mahogany and lots of resin to keep it from moving or leaking on the inside.
