Classic_Boat_2016-06

NIGEL SHARP

Top: The original

binnacle made by

the Herreshoff

Manufacturing

Company.

Bottom: Running

backstay tackles

SERENADE

Herreshoff who also worked for Burgess) before moving

to California in the late 1920s. Although he subsequently

became known as “the Herreshoff of the West”, many

believe he never attained the reputation he deserved.

Having initially considered another Potter design – the

California 32 (32ft on the waterline and 46ft overall)

which was originally intended to be a double-ender until

one of the first owners expressed a preference for a

transom stern – Heifetz commissioned Serenade as he

really wanted to take part in the Transpac from San

Francisco to Honolulu, and to do so in some comfort.

There was clearly a sensitivity that any hand injury could

end Heifetz’ career (his hands were reputed to be insured

for a million Dollars) and some features of the boat

reflected this – the sheet winches, for instance, were

mounted on the coachroof clear of the cockpit,

supposedly on the insistence of the insurance agent – and

perhaps that was the reason why his wife apparently put

him off entering the Transpac. In 1942 – when he was

planning to commission Potter to design an M-Class

yacht which he would have called Symphony, although

nothing ever came of it – Heifetz sold Serenade to the

Isaacs brothers, one of whom, Charles, married the

actress Eva Gabor the following year. During the decade

T

his was one of the more bizarre sails of

my life. I was on board the N Class sloop

Serenade off St Tropez where, surely, the

sun always shines; and yet the rain was

falling as it had rarely fallen before and it

was finding its way past a set of foul

weather gear I had previously regarded as pretty good.

Before we left the dock, the skipper and I had agreed

that I should sail more as a “guest” than a crew member

and keep out of the way in the cockpit, so as not to

interfere with the well-practised routines of the regular

crew. It was just as well because throughout the race the

dialogue was entirely in French, leaving me bewildered

and wishing I had worked harder all those years ago – I

failed French O-Level three times with worsening grades

• while the owner sat next to me occasionally calling out
  incomprehensible words with various levels of
  excitement in his voice.
  Serenade was designed by Nicholas Potter for Jascha
  Heifetz – “perhaps the greatest violinist of his time”
  according to the New York Times – and built in 1938 by
  Wilmington Boatworks, California. In his early years
  Potter had worked for both Nat Herreshoff and Starling
  Burgess (and was a lifelong friend of Nat’s son L Francis