Nineteen vessels have been built by this firm for the United States government.
“There is a certain speed that attaches to every vessel, which may be called its natural rate,” says Lewis Herreshoff; “it is mainly governed by its length and the length of the carrier wave which always accompanies a vessel parallel to her line of motion. When she reaches a speed great enough to form a wave of the same length as the moving body, then that vessel has reached her natural rate of speed, and all that can be obtained above that is done by sheer brute force. The natural limit of speed of a boat forty feet long is about ten miles an hour; of a vessel sixty feet in length, twelve and one-quarter miles; of one a hundred feet long, fifteen and three-fourths miles; of one two hundred feet long, twenty-two miles.”
As the speed is increased, this double or carrier wave, one-half on either side of the yacht, lengthens in such a way that the vessel seems to settle more the faster she goes, and so has to climb the very wave she makes. Hence the motive power must be increased much faster than the speed increases. Further, in order to avoid this settling and consequent climbing as much as possible, lightness of construction, next to correct proportions, is made the great desideratum in the Herreshoffs’ ideal boat. They use wood wherever possible, as it is not only lighter than metal, but is reasonably strong and generally much more durable. Wherever heavy strains come, a bracing form of construction is adopted, and metal is used also.
The engine of the “Stiletto” weighs ten pounds for each indicated horse-power; that of the “Cushing,” fifteen. The entire motive plant of the “Cushing” weighs sixty-five pounds for each horse-power; that of the “City of Paris,” two hundred. Comparing displacement, the former has eight times the power of the latter.
For four years our government kept a staff of officers stationed at the Herreshoff works to experiment with high-speed machinery, in which the firm then led the country. One of their steamers, ascending the St. Lawrence River to the Thousand Islands, ran up all the rapids except the Lachine, where a detour by canal was made. The Canadians were deeply impressed by this triumph.
THE BLIND BROTHERS
One of the Herreshoff sisters is blind and a remarkable musician; and one brother blind who studied music in Berlin, and who conducts a school of music in Providence. Lewis Herreshoff, one of the boat-builders, is also blind. He, too, is a fine musician and an excellent bass singer, having received careful vocal training in Europe. He has fine literary taste, a very clear style, and writes for magazines, especially on boat-building and engineering. He has a large foreign correspondence, all of which he answers personally on the typewriter. It would be difficult to find a greater favorite with young people, to whom he devotes much of his time, teaching them games or lessons, also how to sail or row a boat, how to swim or float, and how to save each other from drowning. When walking along the street with a group of chatting children, he will ask, “What time is it by the clock on St. Michael’s Church?” pointing right at the steeple. He will wind a clock and set it exactly, and regulate it, if it does not go right.
THE PERSONALITY OF JOHN B. HERRESHOFF
From his boyhood, John B. Herreshoff evinced a great fondness for boats and machinery, finding most pleasure, in his leisure hours, when boys of his age usually think only of play, in haunting boat-builders’ yards and machine shops, studying how and why things were done, and reading what had been done elsewhere in those branches of industry, beyond his field of observation.
At the age of eleven, he was studying the best lines for vessels’ hulls and making models and three years later he began building boats.