The 1980s tend to get a bad press as a time when young people left the country in droves, searching for jobs that matched their potential and training. Those of us who stayed at home to battle on, but now find ourselves living in one of the allegedly richest countries in Europe, survived the bad times by generally not keeping overly close tabs on those who had made the Great Escape. For indeed, some had more or less vanished without trace, while others were rumoured to have made some sort of determinedly-sought breakthrough to become household names in their own household, or even better.

GETTING OUT IN 1985

One such is Ken Corry, now Commodore of the highly-regarded 1901-founded Los Angeles Yacht Club. Yet when he departed the intense Cork sailing scene in 1985, boats and sailing in his new life in California were barely even on the to-do list as he worked with increasing success on the lively West Coast, where the multi-opportunity California is nearly 15% of the entire US total economy, while New York state is only 8%.

Neill Love from Cork with Commodore Ken Corry at the Los Angeles Yacht Club

DEEPLY INTO CROSSHAVEN JUNIOR SAILING

Yet back in Crosshaven he’d been completely invested in the junior sailing programme, having joined the Royal Cork YC as a kid in 1970, then moving up the ranks to race in the Mirrors and be a helm in the RCYC Team which beat Sutton Dinghy Club for the historic Book Trophy by a cool 17.5 points in 1976.

The most junior of juniors – a young Ken Corry at Crosshaven (left) with Eddie Tingle and the late Suzanne Crosbie. The lifejackets back then were so uncomfortable that where the rules said “Life Jackets Must Be Worn When Sailing”, the youngsters interpreted that to a very fine point, and in a less prosperous era of fewer items of equipment, life jackets could be used as fenders when the boats weren’t actually under way

Success! Forty-eight years after the event, the 1976 page of “The Book” show young helm Ken Corry (bottom left) proving his worth for Royal Cork in the annual tournament against Sutton Dinghy Club

MOVING UP THE ROYAL CORK SAILING RANKS

Then he went on to the National 18s for a couple of years before being elevated to a crewing role on Denis Doyle’s new Crosshaven-built Frers 51 Moonduster in 1981, going on to race with The Doyler in that year’s Admiral’s Cup including the Fastnet, and the Sardinia Cup in Porto Cervo in the Mediterranean in 1982. By 1984, he had been swept into the wave of enthusiasm for the J/24s, crewing both for Stephen Hyde in that year’s Worlds at Poole, and subsequently with Anthony O’Leary in the legendary Flying Ferret.

Fresh out of Crosshaven Boatyard in May 1981, Denis Doyle’s new Frers 51 Moonduster had a youthful crew – including Ken Corry – who took a while to realise just how much they needed to ease the backstay when running. Photo: W M Nixon

But in the mid-1980s, the winters were long and the economic outlook was bleak, and in 1985 he fetched up in California, keen to work. The way his friend Neill Love back in Cork tells it, his reinvolvement – eventually to the highest levels – in the sailing scene in the new environment came about in a very laid-back style:

• Sailed casually with friends for a number of years before becoming a partner (and now sole owner) of a Cal 40 in restoration project.
• Joined Board of Directors (the Committee) in Los Angeles Yacht Club 2018
• Launched superbly restored and successful Cal 40 in 2021
• Commodore LAYC 2024

Joining the real club….the restoration of Ken Corry’s Cal 40 nears completion in 2021

It’s a beautiful story, and the involvement of a Cal 40 is the cream on the cake. Back in 1963, sailors of a modernist mind in Ireland were much taken by the new van de Stadt-designed Excalibur 36, virtually all fibreglass and with a spade rudder in the newest of the new styles, completely separate from the keel. There was an attempt to get an OD class going in Dun Laoghaire, but it had petered out by the 1970s, as moving from the very stylish and classic DB24s to the utterly plastic fantastic Excalibur was just too much of a leap.

CAL 40 IS CALIFORNIA’S ENDURING CLASSIC

But meanwhile, in California in 1963, Bill Lapworth unveiled the Cal 40, the same concept as the Excalibur 36, but with a more slim Pacific style in that very useful extra 4ft of length and enough traditional varnish-work – particularly a wooden cockpit coaming – to keep many traditionalists happy.

The ultimate restored Cal 40 – Stan and and Sally Honey’s Illusion sweeps into another ocean race win. After many years of massive successes on both the Pacific and Atlantic coats of the US with Illusion, Stan and Sally have gone over to the dark side with the purchase of a fully-powered trawler yacht, while Illusion has gone to Stan’s nephew “as he gets what she means”.

To cut a long story short, you won’t see any Excalibur 36s making the offshore racing scene these days. Yet in the US on both coasts the Cal 40 wonderboat just keeps on winning, and restoring one – as super-sailors Stan and Sally Honey did with their hugely successful yet ancient Illusion, which had bullet holes in the hull when they took on the job - is looked on along the West Coast as an almost sacred duty for serious sailors.

Thus from being someone from a cosy Irish sailing community who was making a leap into the dark in moving to the Coast, Ken Corry is now very much at home at the heart of Los Angeles sailing and its finest traditions. Rather than travelling to visit, he is the one to be visited – he has had Neill Love calling by, and when his mother Sheila arrived, they were able to get together with Ron Holland down from Vancouver, and his daughter Kelly.

And so far, he seems to have comfortably resisted any projects to make the LAYC the Western Station of the RCYC, but may well be open to the idea that the RCYC becomes the Eastern Station of the LAYC.

Sailing folk from several homes in Ken Corry’s home club are (left to right) Ken’s mother Sheila, Ron Holland down from Vancouver, Ken Corry in one of the places he knows best, and Ron Holland’s daughter Kelly.