John Alfred Spencer (6 July 1931 – 4 March 1996) was a

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

boat designer.

Biography

Spencer was born in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

and moved to Eketahuna in 1933. He spent most of his life in New Zealand. He was a well-known designer of sailing boats of all sizes, including the Cherub, Javelin (NZ), Firebug and Flying Ant classes of sailing dinghies. His designs used thin plywood, hard chines, a vertical stem and stern and light displacement. The minimum weight for a Cherub hull was and a Firebug is . Spencer's most famous design was arguably the 62-foot hard-chined ''Infidel'', later known as ''Ragtime'', which he designed and built for Tom Clark, a New Zealand industrialist. ''Ragtime'' was launched in late 1964 and went on to win the 1967 Auckland Class A Championship. Eventually sold to US owners, ''Ragtime'' won the 1973 and 1975 Honolulu Transpac Races, the 2008 Transpac Tahiti Race, and Division II of the 2008 Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race.

References

1931 births 1996 deaths People from Melbourne Australian emigrants to New Zealand New Zealand yacht designers {{NewZealand-bio-stub