The Harbor View Boating and Sportsman's
club was formed in the summer of 1948 by a group of sports and boat
enthusiasts numbering about 40.
Maynard Keaton, now deceased, was Commodore from the beginning until 1954.
He and Mr. Whiteman, who is also deceased, were acclaimed the spark plugs in
the founding and organizing of the Club.
In the ensuing years, the charter members accumulated enough money to
finally have a channel dug in 1953, after two previous failures. This was
accomplished by several dances, raffles, feather parties, and by selling a
promise of a channel through a marsh. The present club property was also
acquired in this same year.
In 1954, Clarence Ankele who previously served as able Vice-Commodore was
elected Commodore. With much time spent negotiating, our present channel was
finally acquired. Our application into the A.Y.C. was accepted. The building
of docks was started. Progress was rather slow at first because of much work
to be done in grading and pile-driving. As the membership increased, a new
by-law was added which required each able bodied member to work 24 hours per
year. This speeded up the progress decidedly.
In 1955, Mike Borsos, a hard-working member, was elected Commodore. With
John Zemenski serving as his Harbor Master, he kept things going very well.
Due to the business demands of Borsos he was forced to relinquish his
leadership to Vice-Commodore George Evans in mid-year. Evans carried on
successfully for the remaining term. During this time a building committee
was appointed to start drawing up plans for a new clubhouse.
In 1956-1957, George Weatherwax
was elected Commodore. Under his term, the tempo of building more docks was
rapidly increased due to the increasing number of members. The banks of our
channel were widened and straightened and the marsh was starting to be
filled. In the future, we hope to use this as a park.
April
2, 1957, the old clubhouse was razed and construction of our present club
house was started immediately. Construction progressed so rapidly that the
first meeting in the new building was held on July 2, 1957, exactly three
months after we started to tear down the old building. Primarily all of the
work was done by the members.
On September 2, 1957, the
name of the club was officially changed to the Harbor View Yacht Club along
with the colors and burgee.
In 1958 Bill Shimman was elected Commodore. He insisted that this club was
large enough and equipped well enough to hold an A.Y.C sanctioned Regatta.
An Auxiliary was also organized and is functioning quite successfully.
In these past
years, we presently are officially associated with I-LYA, AYC, IOBG, with a
Ladies Auxiliary and IOSG.
