Charles Bailey Sr (left) and Charles Bailey Jr (right), with the latter’s sons Ernest and Gladwyn (middle, left and right).

Photographer unknown, reproduced courtesy of Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, New Zealand Maritime Museum Hui Te Ananui a Tangaroa

The scow Vixen, built by Charles Bailey Sr in 1883.

Photograph by Henry Winkelmann, Winkelmann Collection, Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, New Zealand Maritime Museum Hui Te Ananui a Tangaroa

CHARLES BAILEY SR

(1845–1923)

Charles Bailey Sr was a major Auckland boatbuilder in the late 1800s, and his sons followed in his footsteps.

Island traders to racers

Charles Bailey Sr was born in Auckland and learned his trade with Devonport boatbuilder George Beddoes. About 1872, he bought Beddoes’ business and began trading under his own name.

Bailey produced diverse boats, from Pacific island traders to ferries to racing yachts. The yachts were centreboarders (including Pet and Toy) and keelboats (including Daphne, Erin and Fleetwing). They raced successfully in New Zealand and Australia.

Bailey was renowned for his fine craftsmanship. Like all builders of the time, he did everything from scratch, working logs with saw, axe and adze. He built from half-models as he wasn’t schooled in draughtsmanship.

Father-and-son team

Father-and-son team

One of Bailey’s sons, Charles Jr, joined the business in 1878, aged 14, learning his trade and design skills under his father’s critical eye.

Perhaps Charles Sr’s best-known yacht was one of his last, the 64-foot (19.51m) keelboat Viking (1893). Viking was the largest yacht in New Zealand for more than 40 years.

Bailey retired in 1894 and Charles Jr and his younger brother Walter acquired the business, trading as C. & W. Bailey. The partnership was later dissolved after financial difficulties, but both Charles Jr and Walter went on to make their own names in the boatbuilding world.

ON DISPLAY

See the half-model yacht Rita, designed and built by Charles Bailey Sr, in Rise of a Yachting Nation.