As the Dutch rose to dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the first yacht became a leisure craft used first by royalty and secondly by the burghers on the canals and the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing was incidental, arising as private matches. English yachting began with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his return to the English monarchy in 1660, the city of Amsterdam sent him a 20-metre (66-foot) leisure boat with a beam (maximum width) of 5.6 m (18 feet), which he then named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, ruled 1685–88), ordered for more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and returning, on a £100 wager. Yachting rose as classy for the affluent and royalty, but after that period the fashion did not last.

The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was formed around about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard group, and had much naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued a fictional enemy. The club went on, for the large part as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when joining with other groups, it became the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

Yacht racing was seen in some ordered fashion on the Thames about the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland instigated the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to monarchy in 1820, it came to be known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded with a racing fight, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht association had been initiated at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal patronage made the Solent – the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight – the perpetual site of British yachting. The club at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, again at the ascension of George IV. Every member was required to own boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing matches for large stakes were held, and the social life was wonderful. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats grew in size to over 350 tons.

In North America, yachting was first accomplished with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English held power. Sailing was for the most part for pleasure and found its apogee in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which traveled on the Mediterranean Sea and created a minimum of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first continuing American yacht club, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens instigated the New York Yacht Club while on board his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats
The Early sailing yachts took the style of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century through the latter half of the 19th century. The craft of large yachts was originally greatly put upon by the success of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a group started by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) found its namesake after its victory at Cowes in 1851. Earlier yachts were not designed and manufactured in the modern sense, with just a model being used. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did what was known as naval architecture come into action. Not until the 1920s did the employment of the research of aerodynamics do for the craft of sails and rigging what it had earlier done for hulls.

Because almost all sailboats had to be individually built, there was a requirement for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were built. Thus, a rating rule was written, which ended up in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and amended in 1919. In the present day, one of the fastest flourishing areas in the sailing industry is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are built to single requirements in length, beam, sail area, and other elements (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing between these boats can be held on an even basis with no handicapping necessary. A perfect example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class taken on for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.

As long as yachting was an activity largely for the royal and the affluent, money was no problem, and the size of boats increased, in both length and weight. The rise and desire of smaller boats happened in the latter half of the 19th century from the sailing of the Englishmen R.T. McMullen, a stockbroker, and E.F. Knight, a barrister and journalist. A trip around the world (1895–98) sailed single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray made plain the seaworthiness of less sizeable boats. Following this in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure boats became more popular, down to the dinghy, a favoured training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, yachts of less than 3 m were traveled in single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.

Kinds of power yachts
Following the decade 1840–50, during which steam was set to replace sail power in public boats, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were increasingly used in leisure yachts. Large power yachts were developed to a high degree, and long-distance travel became a favourite pastime of the rich. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; these then gave way to yachts powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller kind of propulsion. As well as naval and merchant boats, auxiliaries carrying both sail and power were the yacht fashion for a number of years. By the latter half of the 20th century, a lot of yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were solely power yachts that had gasoline or diesel engines.

During the last decade of the 19th century there was a push in the design of more sizeable steam yachts. Conspicuous among these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, containing triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was sailed by a crew of over 150. The Mayflower, bought by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and saw active service in World War II.

As more sizeable and more reliable internal-combustion engines were produced, many big boats started using them for power. The development of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, progressed for World War I. In the decade following, large power-yacht manufacture blossomed, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. In that time the largest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.

The building of big power boats fell away from 1932, and the fashion thereafter was in preference of smaller, less expensive yachts. Following World War II, lots of small naval boats were traded by private owners for conversion to yachts. At the late 20th century, yachting is a internationally loved competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen personally owning and keeping their own small pleasure craft. The amount of craft and sailors increased steadily, not only in the traditional locations by the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.

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