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Then and Now: Wooden boats

1936: Wooden runabouts race across Lake Coeur d’Alene. Wooden boats experienced a revival in the 1980s, and Coeur d’Alene became a place to see the restored beauties, partly because the resort town became a getaway for the wealthy and partly because of Syd Young and StanCraft boats, where boats were built and restored with meticulous care. (The Spokesman-Review photo archive)
1936: Wooden runabouts race across Lake Coeur d’Alene. Wooden boats experienced a revival in the 1980s, and Coeur d’Alene became a place to see the restored beauties, partly because the resort town became a getaway for the wealthy and partly because of Syd Young and StanCraft boats, where boats were built and restored with meticulous care. (The Spokesman-Review photo archive)

Until the mid-1930s, most small boats were made of wood. A few were made of aluminum or steel, but those were mostly work boats. Planked, molded from strips or sided with plywood, wooden boats were elegant but heavy. That meant it took a lot of horsepower to get the boat to planing speed. Before the 1920s, speeds above 15 knots were rare.

Then came the fiberglass revolution. Owens-Corning patented a spun glass fiber in 1936. In the early 1940s, a resin was created to bind the fibers into a shape it would hold through repeated stress. Within a decade, fiberglass boats began to supersede boats from wooden manufacturers like Chris Craft, Hacker-Craft, Lyman, Gar Wood and Century. “Plastic” boats were light, strong and easy to build, and they went faster with less horsepower. Aluminum boats were popular, too, but fiberglass was stronger, could be molded into sleeker shapes and would last for decades with little maintenance.

Most wooden boat manufacturers were in Michigan, New York or along the Eastern Seaboard. In Montana, Billy Young and his son Stanley turned out wooden boats under the name StanCraft on Flathead Lake starting in 1933. In 1968, grandson Syd Young took over StanCraft, now headquartered in Hayden, and turned the company toward fiberglass cruisers and runabouts.

Through the prosperous second half of the 20th century, a variety of Spokane manufacturers cranked out thousands of boats with brands such as Sun Runner, Bayliner and Fiberform. Since World War II, Hewes Craft in Colville has built aluminum fishing boats. EZ Loader and Calkins boat trailers have been built here. Specialty manufacturers build tugboats, work boats and pontoon boats.

The 1981 movie “On Golden Pond” featured a scene of a classic Chris Craft runabout flying across a lake on a sunny day, reviving interest in wooden boats across the country. Soon Young and his family were repairing and restoring wooden boats for an affluent clientele. Young also began to build luxury StanCraft boats, fitting them with modern high-performance engines and sparing no expense on interior appointments. Some of the gleaming mahogany beauties can cost $400,000.

The annual wooden boat shows this year are in Sandpoint on July 8-10 and in Coeur d’Alene on Aug. 27.

Sun Runner boats filed for bankruptcy in 1989. Bayliner, whose ownership included Fiberform, closed its Spokane plant in 2001.

– Jesse Tinsley