"His boats were eitehr ply or cedar strip. David Ward, Denis Palin, Ted FLack and a few others were involved to some extent in home building during that time."

I don't know if Denis Built a plywood square, I guess he did.
But he has a nice, light, fast Carbon 18square. I went sailing Sunday 10/5/03, and Denis was just rigging as I was leaving. I had just sailed a friends I17R, a whole story in itself there.
As for rigging, Denis trailers his on top of a pop up camper, rigging the whole thing each sail. He does it as fast or faster than I can rig my Nacra 6.0na, and rig the retrofit spinaker.

HIs boat, #727, is simply awesome, beautiful, a work of art.

I bow down to him and chant "I'm not worthy", when I see him at regattas, the Texas City Dike, etc. This guy on this boat are sooo fast. At one of the last regattas we raced in together, Out of 5 races, I finished ahead of him in two races, and corrected out over him in 1! (My N6.0na+sq. top, and spin.) At which point I felt I had reached my pinacle in catamaran sailing, and would be perfectly happy just passing away at that point.

Obviously, this was a rant, and a tribute, to a sailor who has built a light, strong, fast, 18square, and still sails/races it regularly.

I can't leave out Tami and Jay, who have have and sail/race squares.

Todd Bouton
N6.0na + (it's for sale 3,500)

Looking for and Inter, 20 that is!