The Lorna C

[carloscabanas]

Hello

First post here.... I'm wondering if anyone has any information on cabin cruisers from the 1950's. I just finished restoring a boat my grandpa made in 1954. My mother grew up on the boat as well as my generation. The boat is named after my Grandma "Lorna C". We think it may be a dolphin but the boat is 17 feet and not 16. Here is a link to see plans for the dolphin:
http://www.svensons.com/boat/?p=CabinCruisers/Dolphin
I have also seen/heard of something called the ranger at some point but can't find any more information.

I will try to post some pictures.

Carlos

[carloscabanas]

[carloscabanas]

I would have thought that there would be alot of information on this forum. It's been a couple of days and not even a comment!!

The carving in the boat beside my grandma is of my grandpa who built the boat. Here's a picture of the helm. Unfortuatly the little plastic cap is missing on the Wheel.

[michigangeorge]

Carlos, the forum seems to be a bit slow lately but your lack of reponse may be due simply to the fact that it is just a rare design nobody has seen. There were many such plans available in all sorts of publications back then and the homebuilders modified them to suit their needs. In any case, it looks like your grandfather did a good job and you also did a nice restoration. There should be more boats like this around. They were MUCH better looking and more practical than the FG crap being sold today! Take care of her and pass her along to the next generation :-)

[C. Ross]

Carlos-

Welcome! That's really nice boat, and fun to have the family history.

It's not exactly a Dolphin, is it? Length difference that you note. Dolphin has inboard engine and yours was built for outboard. The sheer line looks different -- the Dolphin has a simple curve and yours has a compound curve that looks very nice. And the covering boards slope out a lot more on the Dolphin than yours.

It might help to know where your grandpa built it. Sure, it could have come from a magazine with national distribution but a lot of designs are local. And it wouldn't be the first time that someone took a basic design and modified it.

If by any chance you're in Gull Lake Minnesota, you're not far from a decent new boating museum in Alexandria. There may be some reference materials there.

You might also look in Bob Speltz's books The Real Runabouts. Your boat is kind of a cross-over between a runabout and cruiser, and it might be in his books.

Anybody else able to help Carlos?

[carloscabanas]

Thanks for the responses!!
The boat was built in Calgary, Alberta. Restored in Edmonton, and Gull Lake is about half way between the two. There used to be some plans kicking around but nobody knows where they got to!! The only thing we found was one of those magazines with the dolphin it it. I never really felt it was the dolphin, but some of the structural braces in the frame look identical. Like I say I remember something about a ranger. Here's a couple of pictures as she was being built back up...

Carlos