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As the Dutch found preeminence in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht had been a pleasure craft used first by royalty and then by the burghers on the canals as well as the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Yacht racing was incidental, arising as private games. English yachting originated with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his reaffirmation to the English monarchy in 1660, the city of Amsterdam presented him with a 20-metre (66-foot) pleasure boat with a beam (maximum width) of 5.6 m (18 feet), which he named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, sovereign 1685–88), built 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 fashionable with the rich and nobility, but after that period the fashion did not last.

The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was instigated around about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard association, and had large naval panoply and formality. The closest thing to racing was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued an imagined enemy. The club persisted, mostly as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, when merging with other groups, it became known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

Yacht racing was seen in some organized manner on the Thames around the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV ascended to the throne in 1820, it was then named the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded after a racing dispute, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht organisation had been formed at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal sponsorship made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the continuing location of British racing. The organisation at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, again at the accession of George IV. All members were required to possess boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing tests for large stakes were held, and the club life was splendid. Ultimately Royal Yachting Club boats increased in size to bigger than 350 tons.

In North America, yachting started with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and persisted when the English took power. Sailing was for the most part for leisure and found its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and created a minimum of luxury and elegance for the later yachts in the area from the late 19th century. The first enduring American yacht club, the Detroit Boat Club, was started in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens began the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats
The first sailing yachts took the lines of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the later half of the 19th century. The design of bigger yachts was initially greatly affected by the success of America, which was created by George Steers for a club led by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) had its namesake after its success at Cowes in 1851. Earlier yachts were not designed and built in a contemporary sense, with just a model being used. Not until the second half of the 19th century did what was labeled naval architecture come into being. Not until the 1920s did the use of the science of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what such science had previously done for hulls.

Because most of all sailboats were individually manufactured, there came a desire for handicapping boats previous to the one-design class boats were designed. Thus, a rating rule was created, which is found in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and amended in 1919. In the present day, one of the fastest growing areas in the sailing industry is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are created to single dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other areas (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing for such boats can be held on an even keel with no handicapping required. A perfect example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class taken on board for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.

As long as yachting was an activity mostly for the nobility and the rich, cost was no object, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The ascendancy and popularity of smaller craft occurred in the later half of the 19th century out of the sailing of the Englishmen R.T. McMullen, a stockbroker, and E.F. Knight, a barrister and journalist. A journey around the world (1895–98) led single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray made plain the hardiness of smaller boats. Thereafter in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and recreational yachts became commonplace, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, yachts of less than 3 m were sailed single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.

Kinds of power yachts
Following the decade 1840–50, at which point steam started to replace sail power in commercial vessels, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were employed more and more in leisure boats. Sizeable power yachts were furthered to a high standard, and long-distance sailing turned into a favourite activity of the well off. The early power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; they then gave way to boats powered by the completely submerged screw or propeller sort of propulsion. Like naval and merchant yachts, auxiliaries carrying both sail and power were the yacht standard for many years. By the latter half of the 20th century, several yachts were still auxiliaries, but the majority were exclusively power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.

During the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the construction of more sizeable steam yachts. Notably among these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, that had triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was sailed by a crew of at least 150. The Mayflower, commissioned by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and was used in active service for World War II.

As more sizeable and more dependable internal-combustion engines were developed, many big craft began using them for power. The creation of the diesel engine, using heavy oil for fuel, progressed in World War I. From the decade following, big power-yacht building blossomed, hitting a climax in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. From that time the largest auxiliary yacht manufactured was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.

The building of bigger power yachts lessened after 1932, and the style after that was in preference of smaller, less pricey yachts. From World War II, lots of small naval craft were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. In the late 20th century, yachting is a widespread popular activity enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually manning and upkeeping their own small leisure craft. The number of craft and sailors increased steadily, not only in the traditional places along the beach but also on inland waterways and lakes.

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