Art Defever has passed...

sunchaser said:

Scott - I may have this wrong but the CTF yard is the current DeFever build site? My 48 is hull # 168 and built at CTF. The 48s took a 6 year or so hiatus in the 90s as builders in Taiwan were fussing over the molds until Art stepped in to help pick up the pieces. Is Pocta the town and CTF the yard?

Art's last boat is a gem and for the right buyer (GG you missed one!) would be a very nice live aboard with serious sea keeping chops. I believe this boat was built in the same yard as are Outer Reefs today.

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No, POCTA is the "Pacific Ocean Countries Trading Association", one of the yards that built DeFevers.

As I mentioned in the GG thread, I was aboard Art's boat for several nights and it's very nice. One thing I really like about his bigger designs is that the master cabin is always separated from the guest cabins by the ER, which gives great privacy.

As for the Outer Reefs, I have always wondered exactly where they came from. To my eye, their hulls look very much like the DeFever hulls. But beyond that I have no further information. Knowing Art, I find it very hard to believe that he would have allowed this without a royalty and mention of the DeFever brand. This was actually a bone of contention with the Grand Alaskan brand as well, he was unhappy that the DeFever brand was not more prominent and I believe that he took legal action against the then-importer (Oviatt Marine, I think).

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

Sceptic said:

Scott, those are DeFever 41's. Of course I don't know if they were all called that.

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I have a rough database of Art's designs and who produced them, and all of those boats are shown as design "70-38". Maybe there were two different hulls? The one person who would probably know is Doug Sharp, Art's (estranged) former partner and son-in-law, now in solo practice.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

IslandEagle said:

In the meantime, American Marine wanted some larger Alaskans, but since they did not want to pay royalties to Art, they turned to another naval architect, Dair Long, for the Alaskan 49 and 53. Art successfully sued them, but by the time he won American Marine had gone belly up. Art emerged with the name Alaskan and the rights to the boats, which was one of the reasons that the new Grand Banks stopped producing the Alaskan series.

As for Tony Flemming, I was told by Art that Tony build his first Flemming for an owner of a Defever 52, a pilothouse trawler built by Oriental Boat Company (OBC) in Japan. According to Art, this was one of the first boats Tony had designed, and Art claimed that Tony copied the 52 basically down to the inch.

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I'm not sure about Dair Long, but Robert (Bob) Dorris (American Marine) was involved as well as a guy named Larry Drake(Flemming). Certainly De Fever influenced many. And the design world is full of, "He copied my stuff!" claims.

Tad Roberts said:

I'm not sure about Dair Long, but Robert (Bob) Dorris (American Marine) was involved as well as a guy named Larry Drake(Flemming). Certainly De Fever influenced many. And the design world is full of, "He copied my stuff!" claims.

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Hi Tad, well, it was Art who told me that Dair did the Alaskan 49 and 53, but I've also heard that it was Bob Dorris. We'll probably never know at this point. As for the Flemming, that one definitely bugged Art, because (so Art told me) the Flemming client was moving up from one of Art's boats and actually invited Tony aboard the DeFever to let him measure it. Now personally, if I was the client, I'd do the same thing too. But in any event, Art definitely took umbrage.

And of course the DeFever 46 was definitely directly influenced by Bill Garden's Blue Heron series. And then there was the Nordhaven 46 and Al Mason's earlier cruiser, and and and...

So it goes.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

Looking randomly through a pile here I found the Alaskan 46 built by American Marine advertized in April of 1968, and another ad for the Alaskan 55 by American Marine in Yachting of November, 1971, design credit to Robert Doris.

And yes, the A46 is clearly a compressed version of Blue Heron.....

Tad Roberts said:

another ad for the Alaskan 55 by American Marine in Yachting of November, 1971, design credit to Robert Doris.

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Yes, looks like you are right, it was Bob Dorris and not Dair Long.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

And in September of 1973, the Alaskan 49 built by American Marine and designed by Robert Dorris. I'm sorry but that is identical to the 46 except for additional length and 17,800 additional pounds of displacement......

Tad Roberts said:

And in September of 1973, the Alaskan 49 built by American Marine and designed by Robert Dorris. I'm sorry but that is identical to the 46 except for additional length and 17,800 additional pounds of displacement....

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Exactly. And in any event, according to the contract Art was supposed to design any additional Alaskans. I'm assuming that the trial was pretty open-and-shut.

It's interesting to note that after this Art never again allowed his boats to be sold under another brand. They were always DeFevers.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

Having just spent time on a Defever 49 this week that we came within 1/2" of making an offer on, I am sorry to hear of Art's passing. His designs are timeless and will withstand the test of time.

Tad Roberts said:

And in September of 1973, the Alaskan 49 built by American Marine and designed by Robert Dorris. I'm sorry but that is identical to the 46 except for additional length and 17,800 additional pounds of displacement......

View attachment 18029

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This past summer I met some folks who had recently finished a major rebuild of an Alaskan 49. As I was walking the docks at Sullivan Bay I commented that it was an interesting DeFever. We had a lot of fun talking about their high quality rebuild and work, much of it done by some of the ex-Sunfjord people out of the SeaTac area.

Was the Alaskan 49 out of Bellingham? We met a couple in Ganges with an absolutely immaculate Alaskan 49. The wood hull was so perfect it looked like a glass hull. They keep the boat in Bellingham, I believe in a boathouse.

Marin said:

Was the Alaskan 49 out of Bellingham? We met a couple in Ganges with an absolutely immaculate Alaskan 49. The wood hull was so perfect it looked like a glass hull. They keep the boat in Bellingham, I believe in a boathouse.

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It could be the same vessel, they own several ski resorts Crystal Mtn being one. I do recall they had boat work done in SeaTac area.

I had a woodie Awlgripped, it too looked like gel coat.

I have a friend that owns a 46' Alaskan. He has always called it a Defever and only attended Defever rendezvous instead of the Grand Banks ones where some Alaskan owners participate. He was very proud to have met and befriended Mr. Defever at these events.

mahal said:

I have a friend that owns a 46' Alaskan. He has always called it a Defever and only attended Defever rendezvous instead of the Grand Banks ones where some Alaskan owners participate. He was very proud to have met and befriended Mr. Defever at these events.

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As you saw from Tad's posting, these were sold as "DeFever Alaskans" until the business was acquired by American Marine about 1971.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

I was fortunate to be at the Trawler Fest in Anacortes when Art was awarded the lifetime achievement award and I got to meet him. It was a pleasure meeting Art and discussing his designs.

Lately I have wondered how much input Art had on the DeFever 53 Performance Offshore Cruiser (POC) and the DeFever 57 Yachtfisher http://www.powerboatguide.com/Table_of_Contents_files/DeFever%2053%20POC%20Motor%20Yacht.pdf. The deck house of the POC doesn't look like a DeFever design and it's use of a fully cored semi-displacement hull seems counter most of Art's previous designs that I'm aware of. Was the POC mainly the work of Sharpe?

portager said:

Lately I have wondered how much input Art had on the DeFever 53 Performance Offshore Cruiser (POC) and the DeFever 57 Yachtfisher Was the POC mainly the work of Sharpe?

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I've had the very same thought, but not being a DeFever fan hide I've bitten my tongue. I met Art and Doug, here in their Shelter island office, when my brother was putting the fiinishing touches on his 57 Yachtfisher. (I've always thought that the 57 YF was just a 53 POC with an extension.) At that time, one could sense the "growing gap" between the two.

To all the DeFever fans:

I've had the pleasure of cruising on 2 different DeFevers and enjoyed both cruises immensely. Sorry guys & Gals but I love the lines of the Fleming 55 much more. (JMHO)

1) Defever 57

2) Fleming 55

sunchaser said:

It could be the same vessel, they own several ski resorts Crystal Mtn being one. I do recall they had boat work done in SeaTac area.

I had a woodie Awlgripped, it too looked like gel coat.

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This is the Alaskan 49 we saw and talked to the owners about in Ganges last September. Beautiful design, beautiful boat. I would not want this design in wood (which it is) unless I could keep it in a boathouse and pay other people to maintain it. But I'd love to have it in fiberglass (Fleming).

portager said:

Lately I have wondered how much input Art had on the DeFever 53 Performance Offshore Cruiser (POC) and the DeFever 57 Yachtfisher. The deck house of the POC doesn't look like a DeFever design and it's use of a fully cored semi-displacement hull seems counter most of Art's previous designs that I'm aware of. Was the POC mainly the work of Sharpe?

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This is a good question, and pretty difficult to answer. The quick overview is that before their estrangement, Art and Doug both worked on the designs. To my eye at least it is clear who did the design work, and in this particular case I would say that it was Doug.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

SeaHorse II said:

1) Defever 57

2) Fleming 55

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Here's a better comparison, and the design that Flemming supposedly copied. Pretty close!

View Boat Photos - YachtWorld.com

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

SeaHorse II said:

... I've had the pleasure of cruising on 2 different DeFevers and enjoyed both cruises immensely. Sorry guys & Gals but I love the lines of the Fleming 55 much more, (JMHO)

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Unfortunately, I'm about one winning lottery ticket shy of owning a Fleming 55. OTOH, I see some DeFever POC's in my price range.

IslandEagle said:

..... and the design that Flemming supposedly copied.

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Poor Tony. When you are successful...people are constantly taking shots at you!

portager said:

Unfortunately, I'm about one winning lottery ticket shy of owning a Fleming 55. OTOH, I see some DeFever POC's in my price range.

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I feel the same way about the Ferrari 458 but I've found some of the Ford Focus cars are in my price range.

SeaHorse II said:

Poor Tony. When you are successful...people are constantly taking shots at you!

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Hey, as Tad says, this has been going on forever. Here's Bill Garden's Blue Heron design, 10 years before the Alaskans and 20 years before the Flemmings. Look familiar?



She's for sale, too! http://www.yachtcouncil.com/Used/62...WA?Boatsforsalesearch=basicinfo&vessel=112462

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

IslandEagle said:

Hey, as Tad says, this has been going on forever. Here's Bill Garden's Blue Heron design, 10 years before the Alaskans and 20 years before the Flemmings. Look familiar?
e

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That boat is even better looking than deFever's pilothouse design/American Marine's Alaskan. I like the lower profile. The superstructure is in better proportion to the hull in Garden's design too my eye.

Marin said:

The superstructure is in better proportion to the hull in Garden's design too my eye.

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Well, I guess that's where we split the sheets, Marin! I think the superstructure is too low for the length of the boat and the sight line from the pilot's point of view seems a little restricted. (Can't really tell, though, from this photo.) Overall, I like the boat!

Thanks a bunch Scott! I have never seen this boat before!

Well, don't forget Walt that my single all time favorite boat design is the Elco 80' PT of WWII. I was allowed to crawl all over one of these boats for hours in Fall River, Mass., and there is not a thing about the design, inside and out, that I don't like. So a low or lower superstructure relative to the hull's freeboard always looks better to me than a high superstructure relative to the freeboard.

It's not that I dislike the Alaskan 49, the deFever 46 or the Fleming 55. They are aesthetically wonderful designs, no question. But I feel the Garden design in Scott's post, a design I had never seen before, is even better than the other three to my sense of aesthetics.

Marin said:

But I feel the Garden design in Scott's post, a design I had never seen before, is even better than the other three to my sense of aesthetics.

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You are forgiven, Marin, but it does sadden me to know that design wise, we are not on the same page.

Marin said:

That boat is even better looking than deFever's pilothouse design/American Marine's Alaskan. I like the lower profile. The superstructure is in better proportion to the hull in Garden's design too my eye.

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Remember, the Alaskan 46 was a full 16 feet shorter, so it looks a bit lumpier.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle

Marin said:

But I feel the Garden design in Scott's post, a design I had never seen before, is even better than the other three to my sense of aesthetics.

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Marin, I rarely tell you want to do, but you must (I mean must must must) go and get Bill Garden's two books:

Yacht Designs by William Garden: Intl Marine Pub 9780877420668 - Better World Books

Yacht Designs II by William Garden: Mystic Seaport Museum Inc 9780913372616 - Goodwill Books

I promise, you will not be disappointed.

Scott Welch
Island Eagle