The Ditchburn Legacy
New Book Celebrates a Premier Canadian Builder

By Harold Shield
Photographs by Bev McMullen

One of the most enduring symbols of the magic that is Muskoka is the varnished mahogany runabout or launch that provided family transportation between wharf and cottage, often serving for several generations of owners, and today, a valuable badge of the family’s claim to belonging in this increasingly expensive vacation paradise. Many different builders supplied the needed vessels but the Ditchburn Boat Company dominated the field, becoming Canada’s largest and most famous boat builder in the twenties and thirties.
 

The Canadian history of the company began in 1869 with the arrival in Muskoka of four Ditchburn brothers from England, attracted by the government offer of free land in the newly opened Muskoka district. They soon discovered that they must find some alternative to farming as the rocky pine-covered land offered little hope for agriculture. Fortunately, tourism was already beginning to become a viable industry and it was here that their future was found.
 

In England, the Ditchburn family had a long connection with boat building – one distant relative, Thomas Joseph Ditchburn, was well known as a pioneer in steel ship construction and in the development of steam power. Drawing on this heritage the Canadian Ditchburn brothers began building rowing boats for fishermen at summer hotels and soon established livery stations at various points around the three lakes.
 

In 1890, Henry Ditchburn, who had become the dominant builder, established a factory in Gravenhurst, adjacent to the Muskoka wharf where the newly established railroad from Toronto delivered vacationers to the waiting steamboats servicing both private cottages and hotels. Joined by his nephew, Herbert, about the turn of the century, Henry’s business flourished. By 1904, Herb had bought out his uncle’s interest and incorporated the business in 1907 with himself as president, his brother Alf and Tom Greavette as directors.
The development of reliable gasoline engines in the early years of the century brought enormous change and expansion to the business. Wealthy cottagers, both Canadian and American, were more than willing to buy larger, faster, and more luxurious vessels. Production was doubling almost every year, new workers were recruited and trained, production was standardized with models offered in various lengths, and catalogues published.
 

The first really large commission came in 1915 from Sir John Eaton with the building of the 73-ft. Kawandag, a truly handsome vessel that served until 1938 for family and guest transportation from the rail points at Gravenhurst, Foot’s Bay, and Barnesdale, to their summer home at Rosseau. This project also marked Herb’s first cooperation with professional marine architects. Designed by the American firm of Bowes and Mower, Kawandag incorporated an extensive range of sophisticated equipment and systems previously unknown to this “backwoods” builder. But rising to the challenge, Herb and his growing work force created a masterpiece in mahogany that vaulted the company into the big leagues.
 

Racing success in the twenties with a fleet of Rainbows, created in cooperation with Harry Greening of Hamilton, brought fame and American customers to Ditchburn. Already the largest builder in Canada, the growing company was now able to penetrate the U.S. market, capitalizing on the racing success and innovations in the Greening Rainbows. Now Ditchburn was working on the leading edge of hull design and mechanical improvement. Amazing for a man who had received his entire education in the rural schools of Muskoka.
Further development was to occur with the opening of a new plant in Orillia in 1924, made necessary with the demand for larger cruisers – vessels so beamy that they could not be transported from the land-locked Muskoka lakes to larger waters. The first project was a 100-ft. cruiser for Commander J.K.L. Ross of Montreal, and many others were to follow. Many Americans who could have chosen the well-known products of U.S. builders opted instead for a Ditchburn cruiser whose design, construction, and individual detail put them in a special class. The Commodore of the New York Yacht Club along with many other members bought a Ditchburn.
 

Unfortunately, it was not to last forever. The collapse of the stock market in October 1929 was to spell the end of a lifestyle, and the failure of many companies both in Canada and United States who catered to wealthy customers with luxury products. The Ditchburn Company was then enjoying its best sales year, had undertaken an expansion of the Gravenhurst plant, and fully expected growth to continue. But custom boat builders were to suffer the most in the ten-year Depression that was to follow the market collapse.
 

The first lay-offs came in July 1930, and by the following year two-thirds of the work force had disappeared. Some work was still undertaken at Orillia but by 1932 the company was bankrupt. Re-organized from 1932 to 1935, Herbert Ditchburn did manage a limited production of smaller less luxurious craft but lack of working capital resulted in a second closing. A third incorporation as the Ditchburn Yacht and Airplane Company featured shareholder investors and managed to produce some magnificent custom vessels but it, too, failed in 1938. If they had survived a few more years they might still be in business today as the war brought business and prosperity to all Muskoka boat builders.
Today Ditchburn products are still recognized as some of the best and most beautiful boats ever built in Canada. Their important innovations in construction, mechanical systems and design produced higher standards of customer satisfaction, safety, and utility. Their vessels possessed a singular beauty – a sculptural quality that sets them apart. Their memory will live on as collectors intend to preserve these Ditchburn treasures forever. It has become the ultimate Muskoka cachet to own a Ditchburn – a masterwork from a master craftsman.
 

An Excerpt from the Book
One Step Ahead
By 1927, the stepped-hull hydroplane was well known to the world, but the racing fraternity had first recognized its virtues. Ditchburn had by now a long experience in racing, having built the famous Rainbows raced by Harry Greening to capture world attention and Gold Cup honours for Canada. Now the desire for greater speed, the ego-drive to own the fastest craft on the lake, was entering the family runabout market. Round-bilged displacement hulls had dominated the protected waters of Muskoka but now an exciting and different product came onto the market.
 

It had long been understood that the displacement hull, which cuts through the water, was subject to upper limits of speed. It can easily be driven to a speed equal to the square root of its waterline length – then it gets a lot tougher. Added power increases wave making, the stern is depressed, and a maximum speed achieved in the order of 1.4 times the square root of the waterline length. More power will not increase the speed; to go faster the hull must be able to rise up in the water and hydroplane across its surface.
 

Pioneer British designer and builder, S.E. (Sam} Saunders of Cowes, England, had built several stepped-hull vessels before World War I, including the multi-stepped 40-foot Maple Leaf IV, the first boat in the world to attain a speed of fifty knots. She defeated the American entries in 1912 and 1913 for the Harmsworth Trophy, proving the efficiency of her hull design.
 

Sam Saunders’ success with stepped-hulls would have been well known to the Ditchburn group, particularly to Bert Hawker, designer and plant foreman. An Englishman who had come to Canada in 1907, Hawker had found work with several Ontario boat builders, including Minett. Home from the War in 1919, he had become an important member of the Ditchburn team. While the designer of the new Viking model is not mentioned in company literature, it was probably largely Hawker’s work.
 

The sales brochure describes the new Viking as a “standardized Gentleman’s Runabout, the fastest boat of its class ever built,” and further claims “unusual speed of 40 to 45 miles per hour with a 150 horsepower engine, made possible by the scientific application of under body lines which greatly eliminate resistance caused by vacuum and wetted surface.”
 

One picture illustrates the vessel carrying 11 passengers, a load of 1700 pounds, and still being able to achieve a speed of 36 miles per hour. A reference is also made to the Ditchburn-built Rainbow I, Harry Greening’s winner of the Fisher Trophy race in Miami in 1920 and 1921.
 

“The Viking is 5 and 1/2 miles faster per hour with a 150 hp motor than the Rainbow I which carried a 300 hp motor.”
 

Ditchburn credited their experience in producing six high-speed patrol boats for the Canadian government as the inspiration for the design. These 38-footers with Lewis machine guns mounted on the foredeck were kept busy on the Atlantic coast chasing down rumrunners. Ditchburn had won the contract by guaranteeing a speed of 31mph for these fast and seaworthy revenue cutters. They actually could achieve 35mph, fully loaded and manned by a crew of three. The government promptly ordered five more.
 

It is probable the speed claims of the Viking brochure were somewhat overstated but with the larger Sterling and Kermath engines introduced the following year the Vikings could indeed surpass the 40 mph mark. Several of the surviving 27-foot Vikings have been re-powered with V-8 engines for even livelier performance but the significant weight reduction may cause trim problems.
 

A single-stepped hydroplane is designed to ride on two points of the hull – amidships, just ahead of the step, and on the hull bottom right aft. Its advantage over a non-stepped hull is that it rises bodily out of the water, fore and aft the same amount, and skims along the top. The angle of attack is built into her, so she does not have to alter her trim in order to plane, as does a stepless boat.
Speed claims aside, the Viking quickly became a very popular model with its hard lines, its brawny, masculine, powerful hull shape, its raised engine hatch, elegant windscreen and its sparkling performance. New hardware designed and manufactured by Ditchburn graced the varnished decks. Leather seating for nine on three benches, plus the possibility of two more in wicker chairs ensured everybody could go along.
 

Still it was not a boat for everyone. An elderly Muskoka cottager recalled Tom Greavette, then sales manager for Ditchburn, coming to the family island to demonstrate the new vessel to his father. Apparently it was not a good day for the demonstration. A light breeze grew steadily stronger and the long uphill pounding to home dock convinced the family to order a more conventional Minett-Shields launch, which offered a slower but more familiar ride.
 

Probably the best known of the seven known survivors is Mowitza II, ordered in September, 1928, by Fred Burgess, an experienced and devoted boater who had visited the Toronto showroom on King Street to finalize his purchase. Delivered in June of 1929, Mowitza II was immediately put to the test in the Muskoka Lakes Association annual regatta where she scored a second in the senior motorboat event. In 1930, she won her class when Whippet, an out-and-out race boat, of Ditchburn manufacture, broke an oil line. She also competed well for another three years but the exact rankings are now unknown.
 

Despite her racing success in that first summer, her new owner had some complaints that he took back to Herb Ditchburn for adjustment. While Ditchburn work was always to the highest standards, Fred Burgess felt the foredeck planking was not matched and varnished to his satisfaction. In addition, he had now seen Mint Julep, a Viking recently delivered to the Eaton family, and the latter vessel had a more elegant dashboard and instrument panel than the one fitted in Mowitza. Two small shelves port and starboard had also been added to this area.
 

Herb Ditchburn wrote to owner Burgess on July 2, 1929, to confirm that the company would respond immediately to all these concerns.
 

“We appreciate that your boat is being used alongside some of our competitors’ best,” he stated in his letter, “and are therefore anxious to bring it into a condition which will leave no room for criticism.”
 

Don’t you wish you could get a warranty response like that today! But this was not an isolated incident. Ditchburn quality was always high and Herb Ditchburn never hesitated to keep it that way.
 

Mr. Burgess paid $5870.50 for his Viking, which was a fair price for a top new custom product from Canada’s largest builder of high quality yachts. It was far beyond the workingman’s range, but wealthy Muskoka residents were enthusiastic and twenty hulls were sold in the next two years. Unfortunately, the disastrous stock market crash was just around the corner, and luxury boat builders were to suffer the most.
 

A totally unknown story came to light in researching Herb Ditchburn’s personal records. Always wanting to be on the leading edge of technical development Ditchburn and a friend, an engineer named Charles Shaw, had secretly been researching and developing a hydrofoil to be mounted under the hull of the 27-ft. Viking to enhance its already remarkable speed and to lessen the power requirement to attain that speed.
 

Cast in aluminium this v-shaped foil was to be mounted just forward of the midship step and would provide lift as speed increased. Eventually the dead weight of the hull and its wetted surface would be significantly reduced while smoother, safer riding and turning would be accomplished, according to Shaw and Ditchburn.
 

Unfortunately it appears that their theories were never put to the test. Ditchburn had agreed to pay the cost of the patent attorney but he was presently overcome by business problems threatening the future of the company. Dated April 5, 1932, the United States Patent Office issued patent number 1,852,680 in the name of Charles Shaw alone. There is no record or knowledge of any attempt to test the invention.
 

Shaw and Ditchburn had also cooperated on the development of a stern drive for which the United States Patent Office issued patent number 1,765,789 on June 24, 1930 to Herbert Ditchburn, of Gravenhurst, Ontario, Canada. Ditchburn’s design involved a tractor propeller, which could be operated in either direction, and a rudder, which could be operated independently. At least one unit was built and tested on a specially built hull, but the story seems to end there. Overcome by the pressing financial problems that enveloped the company all experimentation ceased.
 

Today we can still enjoy seven survivors of the original twenty Vikings produced – six in Ontario and one at Lake Tahoe in California. Their daring design, flashing performance, and handsome appearance never fail to attract attention. They remain a signature work that could never have come from an ordinary builder.