The Bombay Yacht Club was founded in 1846 and 30 years later, with patronage from Queen Victoria, became the Royal Bombay Yacht Club. The seafront clubhouse was built in 1881, and received a number of prominent visitors within its first ten years including: H.R.H. Prince Arthur, their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Connaught, and American railroad tycoon and yachting enthusiast Mr. William Kissam Vanderbilt.
Yachting received a major stimulus in 1911, after King George V and Queen Mary arrived in Bombay on board the Royal P&O liner – HMS Medina. In 1958, the Bombay Club was closed for not accepting Indian members; at the time, RBYC granted honorary memberships to all Bombay Club members and provided a new home for their erstwhile club’s furniture and other effects.
In 1920, the Royal Bombay Yacht Club asked Frank Morgan Giles to design a sail boat especially for the Bombay Harbour. After studying wind, tide and currents data of the harbour for the previous 6 to 8 decades Frank designed a 21ft gaff-rigged sloop called the ‘”Bombay Harbour Seabird”. The boats are not only sailable in Bombay harbour, Seabirds have made extensive cruises to far off places like Goa, Cochin, Colombo, Karachi and others. Seabirds are still sailing there today now fine-tuned with modern materials. Originally the boat was made in Burma / Malabar teak with a clinker hull construction. It later evolved from a wooden clinker hull to a fibreglass clinker hull and finally into a modern carvel hull with no change in dimensions.
Lloyds records show at least 16 Seabird’s built locally in Bombay and there were quite possibly a number more. Not surprisingly all were named after seabirds, the first two in 1920 named ALBATROSS and MOLLIHAWK. The builders were The Royal Indian Marine Dockyard, Alcock, Ashdown & Co. and The Mazagon Dock Co. A further 8 Seabird’s are shown as being built in Cochin by G Brunton & Sons, their home port is shown as Colombo so it is highly probable these were based at the Royal Colombo Yacht Club.
