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Article from the April 1962 'The Rudder' Magazine
I came across this article while searching for old powerboat ads and thought it was an interesting read in light of the many discussions posted here about the future of our sport.
It is not meant to spark a political debate which I know is not welcome here. Instead, I'm posting it to show the difference between how boating was viewed in 1962 compared to what we know now. This writer was serious -- the article was not tongue-in-cheek. And he was paid to present his opinion to the audience of a respected national boating magazine.
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Marine Diary
Written by Stephen B. Hayford
Copyright, The Rudder / April 1962
Recreation is not a simple thing anymore. Recently, the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission, formed under the Eisenhower Administration, gave its long-awaited report and recommendations on the role government should play in this field to the year 2000. The report is a masterpiece of implication, vague platitudes, and cries for the preservation of the "wilderness." But its writers are big thinkers, for they have left a super job to be done: the interpretation of the report by the legislature, or perhaps by another commission appointed through the channels of the new administration.
Hence, the announcement by President John F. Kennedy to the effect that Americans should take to the outdoors in order to keep fit is indeed timely. It is difficult to fathom whether these two seemingly unrelated events have a similar meaning when taken together, but however things work out, we can be sure of one thing now: This is a new beginning to a pattern of recreational life that will be well ordered and available to every citizen who has been given the burden of so much free time by our industries.
If I am permitted a brief gaze into my crystal ball, I wish to predict that, regardless of political affiliation, at some time in our history, the recreational recommendations of our Presidents will become proclamations, and the future reports of our recreational commissions will be gospel throughout the land. It will evolve into the governmental answer to the three-day work week, and the imperial games of Rome.
Of course, it would not have been politic for the President to have singled out any one sport when he made his recommendations for us to take to the outdoors, but he could not have done better had he called his attention to boating in order to achieve his objective. It is one of the most healthful of outdoor sports.
There is no doubt of this because it is truly an all-around activity demanding more of a man than any other game. The sailor needs all his reflexes, an alert mind, a hardy attitude, a quick understanding of the changing ways of the sea, a knowledge of seamanship and all that it implies; he must know the marine engine and its capriciousness, he must know people and the weather and the law; and he must know the elements of survival thoroughly. How better to create healthful citizens than make sailors of as many people as possible?
And so I have a few proposals to make -- an apology on behalf of boating, America's top health sport. Let us avoid the bush beating of time-consuming reports from commissions and proclamations from Presidents. Let us do away with the thousands of complex recreational laws and regulations and the labyrinthian nonsense of trying to find a path to the democratically controlled "wilderness areas" and other reservations.
Instead, let us declare our seas and waters our wilderness. Then let us nationalize boating as the nation's A-OK, number one sport with the built-in health developer. Then let us give the government a mandate to run the annual year-long All-American Regatta Games (in various classes) to find the nation's annual super-sailors.
Thus boating would solve many public problems, besides the national health; we would be assured of having national heroes (and heroines); we could do away with the burdens of free time; we could give a great boost to togetherness (the country that plays together, stays together); we could use our boats without the aid of legal counsel (for there would be one great boating law for all), and in twenty years we will achieve the magnificent national goal of being a country without a recreational problem.
It is not meant to spark a political debate which I know is not welcome here. Instead, I'm posting it to show the difference between how boating was viewed in 1962 compared to what we know now. This writer was serious -- the article was not tongue-in-cheek. And he was paid to present his opinion to the audience of a respected national boating magazine.
************************
************************
Marine Diary
Written by Stephen B. Hayford
Copyright, The Rudder / April 1962
Recreation is not a simple thing anymore. Recently, the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission, formed under the Eisenhower Administration, gave its long-awaited report and recommendations on the role government should play in this field to the year 2000. The report is a masterpiece of implication, vague platitudes, and cries for the preservation of the "wilderness." But its writers are big thinkers, for they have left a super job to be done: the interpretation of the report by the legislature, or perhaps by another commission appointed through the channels of the new administration.
Hence, the announcement by President John F. Kennedy to the effect that Americans should take to the outdoors in order to keep fit is indeed timely. It is difficult to fathom whether these two seemingly unrelated events have a similar meaning when taken together, but however things work out, we can be sure of one thing now: This is a new beginning to a pattern of recreational life that will be well ordered and available to every citizen who has been given the burden of so much free time by our industries.
If I am permitted a brief gaze into my crystal ball, I wish to predict that, regardless of political affiliation, at some time in our history, the recreational recommendations of our Presidents will become proclamations, and the future reports of our recreational commissions will be gospel throughout the land. It will evolve into the governmental answer to the three-day work week, and the imperial games of Rome.
Of course, it would not have been politic for the President to have singled out any one sport when he made his recommendations for us to take to the outdoors, but he could not have done better had he called his attention to boating in order to achieve his objective. It is one of the most healthful of outdoor sports.
There is no doubt of this because it is truly an all-around activity demanding more of a man than any other game. The sailor needs all his reflexes, an alert mind, a hardy attitude, a quick understanding of the changing ways of the sea, a knowledge of seamanship and all that it implies; he must know the marine engine and its capriciousness, he must know people and the weather and the law; and he must know the elements of survival thoroughly. How better to create healthful citizens than make sailors of as many people as possible?
And so I have a few proposals to make -- an apology on behalf of boating, America's top health sport. Let us avoid the bush beating of time-consuming reports from commissions and proclamations from Presidents. Let us do away with the thousands of complex recreational laws and regulations and the labyrinthian nonsense of trying to find a path to the democratically controlled "wilderness areas" and other reservations.
Instead, let us declare our seas and waters our wilderness. Then let us nationalize boating as the nation's A-OK, number one sport with the built-in health developer. Then let us give the government a mandate to run the annual year-long All-American Regatta Games (in various classes) to find the nation's annual super-sailors.
Thus boating would solve many public problems, besides the national health; we would be assured of having national heroes (and heroines); we could do away with the burdens of free time; we could give a great boost to togetherness (the country that plays together, stays together); we could use our boats without the aid of legal counsel (for there would be one great boating law for all), and in twenty years we will achieve the magnificent national goal of being a country without a recreational problem.
