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THE FIRST HUNDRED YEARS
This book starts off with a top pedigree as the authors are well known as historians of the New Zealand recreational boating scene. They have together and separately written several fine books on this topic, as well as magazine articles in the New Zealand boating press. It is very refreshing that both are practitioners of the sport, in particular Harold Kidd who has a background as New Zealand’s national yachting coach.
The Ponsonby Cruising Club is something of an icon in New Zealand yachting and yacht racing circles; this book has ingested much of the flavour and personality of boats, skippers and crews racing on Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour since 1900, when the club was founded. The narrative is very well illustrated, using black and white and latterly colour photographs of yachts and racing in Auckland. Robin Elliott has an enormous resource of such pictures available to him as a result of his previous mainly-Auckland based research.
The five chapters of the book trace the early days of Auckland yachting leading to the foundation of the club, and trace the history of the club through two World Wars, concluding with the move from Saint Mary’s Bay to neighbouring Westhaven. In conclusion three appendices give full records of trophy winners, the Mullet Boat Register (which I suspect is an indulgence Robin could not resist!), and a full list of officers from the inception of the club 1900.
Understandably this book might be regarded as just another in-house club history. It is, however, far more than that. The pedigree of the authors, the breadth of their narrative and photographs, and the position of the club in the Auckland yachting scene make this book as much a part of Auckland’s general yachting history as, say, the books Emmy, Winklemann’s Waitemata, Vintage New Zealand Launches and The Logans.
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