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From: Tom MacNaughton
Date: 03 Jan 2008
Time: 14:20:16 -0500
Remote Name: 66.252.35.200
Yes, we do know how Nathaniel Herreshoff created his designs. In fact his procedures are better documented than almost any other designer. Not only did his son L. Francis detail these procedures carefully in his biography of his father “Captain Nat Herreshoff – The Wizard of Bristol” (see our review linked to our marine publishing order form) but his model making tools and models are preserved at the Herreshoff Museum in Bristol Rhode Island. Further so far as I know every generation of the family since that time has produced at least one yacht designer and these methods have been passed down. Much of this is also preserved in Lesson 5 of our Yacht Design School main curriculum as well. I think you may have a somewhat inaccurate view of the time he had available for design. Certainly he had a hand in everything at Herreshoff Manufacturing but it must be remembered that he was partners with his remarkable brother John who, though blind, supervised most of the business other than the design end. Nathaniel worked almost exclusively on the design end in his office at home. Generally he would work from early morning until about 10am and would then walk, often with one of his children, over to the yard. The child would be placed with the most wonderful “day care” facility known to man, the small boat shop where the men would have the child work with them. Captain Nat would tour all the projects and also look in on draftsmen doing detail drawings and then would return to the house in an hour or so and work the rest of the day and normally into the evening. This way he got to spend most of the day in the house with his family. He was a quick, skilled, and accurate draftsman. He used the methods he did because he was convinced there was no better path to excellence. He had highly evolved mechanisms to take the lines and offsets off the models and the results speak for themselves. However I have noticed that even many great fans of Herreshoff do not seem to understand his methods well. I have heard of people copying certain features of the lines of his vessels piecemeal without understanding where they came from and why. During our students’ training they have to make at least one model as Captain Nat did and they always say that it was a great experience which taught them an amazing amount about how to create good hull lines. Often they say that they intend to go on and make a model of every design they do while working on the lines as they feel the extra level of understanding they gain will help them a great deal.