This January 22 SSSS lost one of our founding Members, long time member of OYC, and one of the most hard-core sailors in Olympia. Ian Wesley Christopher passed away, just short of his 97th birthday.
He was born in 1900 in Seattle and moved to Olympia two years later. He graduated from O.H.S. 1918 and the U. of W. 1923. He married Helen Gray of Wilbur. This past December they celebrated their sixty-third wedding anniversary. Between them they raised four children: Jim, Sonja, Gretchen, and Ian
While he has only attended a Meeting or two recently, he was one of our more active sailors. One of
our oldest trophies is the Christopher Cup for First OA Squaxin Island Race, and it came to us from
OYC where it was a sailing trophy even before there was a SSSS.
To mark his passing, I asked his son to tell us about his father's relationship with boats and sailing.
Dad's interest in boats began as a child and never wavered over the years. He remembered spending summers in the family launch between Olympia and the family's 'summer camp' in Arcadia, with his parents and three younger brothers.
Throughout his life he made sketches of his 'ideal boat'. In 1930 he drafted and built Maude,
a 16 foot skimmer-type 'suicide' sloop. After that he moved up to Galatea, an auxiliary sloop
in the thirty foot range, from Vancouver BC. He, Helen, and friends cruised and raced successfully.
After he sold her in the mid-thirties, she was converted to a Navy launch, Holiday. During
WW II, as Lt. Commander in the Coast Guard Auxiliary, he used her for submarine patrol in lower
Puget Sound.
He began sailing again in 1958, when he and my brother Jim purchased
Tomahawk, a Boeing built Spencer 31 sloop.
During the 1960 Herron Island Race, starting time then was 1400, he, Jim, and their third crew
made a dramatic midnight rescue. What had been a light air race suddenly became a rail-down,
decks-awash race. Between Herron and Hartstene Tomahawk's crew heard cries for
help in the darkness. Someone had dumped a Comet.
On the second try, "Too fast on the first one,"
they scooped two very cold and grateful teenagers out of the water. They were taken below,
stripped of their clothes, and put in sleeping bags for the rest of the race.
Tomahawk still managed to finish fourth, despite a jammed main.
In addition to competition, Dad also liked just being around boats and their environs.
In the 1970s, on a trip to San Francisco, and much to his accompanying families chagrin,
he went to Saint Francis YC to see if he could look around. The sign said "Members Only,"
but he pulled out his SSSS membership card and presented it to the fellow in charge.
The gatekeeper said, "Ian Christopher! I remember reading about you in Yachting Magazine
in the 1930s." Dad and family were happily given a tour of St. Francis.
At the age of 72, Dad bought his first fiberglass boat, his first fin keel boat, and his first boat with Dacron sails: a Cal 27 which he and my mother christened November Song, a reference to their love of music and the years quickly passing by. He single-handed her, raced, cruised, and day sailed her with Helen - and thoroughly enjoyed them both. Until the Cal was sold in 1981.
At age 91, he was not content with his watercolors, music, and reading. He bought a Phil Bolger designed eight footer he had admired sailing effortlessly around Percival Landing, during the Wooden Boat Show. He re-rigged her, more sail area, and built an elliptical rudder. Then had her blow over in one of his early sails.
After that he made do with an occasional sail on Uproar, and lots of talk about boats. Two weeks before his death he was talking of going sailing again. He figured a "lightweight thirty footer with a flat bottom would be just the ticket for Puget Sound."
A celebration of Life was held, and memories shared, February 23rd, at OYC. I hope you were there. He will be missed.
Ian Christopher, Uproar