THE MISSING MASTERPIECE
When John Leather wrote an article about the amateur yacht designer J Pain Clark in the January 2000 Classic Boat, he traced the history of most of the 15 designs he is thought to have created – from the 1899 ‘single-handed cruiser’ Rani III to the 1924 cruising sloop The Hind. Along the way, he introduced readers to a series of elegant yachts with names such as Lora, Lona (three of them), and Rani (five of them!), most owned in quick succession by the designer himself. Leather described Pain Clark as “one of the most talented amateur designers of small cruising yachts before 1914” and ranked him alongside the likes of Albert Strange and George Holmes.
Leather concluded his article by saying: “So far as I can discover, this [The Hind, 1924] was the last of Pain Clark’s designs to be built,” adding that “J Pain Clark’s personal life and his end seem impossible to discover.”
Pain Clark’s designs were and , and visited a third, , while she was on land for sale. You could say I became a bit of a Pain Clark-spotter.
