Rob's Early Years

I would like to hear from you if you have an RL24, RL28, RL34 or a Status and can send me a picture of your boat. You can Email me

Rob's Tribute-A Special Sail-Past to Rob Legg on the occasion of his 90th birthday at the start of the 2018/9 National Championships

Rob's Tribute-The RL24's rafting up and Rob being greeted by admiring owners

Almost certainly the year they were taken was 1946 and I was 17 years old. It was the second 8 footer that I built in the back yard at Collingwood
and the curved mast was the one built upstairs in the hallway. Bob Keeley and I had made our own sails {the one with W on the sail} and were experimenting
with fully battened sails which had not existed before then. Also the 8 footer could have been the first boat in Australia built in plywood and it caused
much mirth with other club members because they thought it would bounce all over the place in the waves.

The curved masts were experimental too as we were trying to control the twist in the sails, and boom vangs had not been thought of then.

The other photos are of other 24s at the time and belonged to other club members.

I think that those photos were all taken from the end of the pier by the Melbourne Age newspaper photographer, Lloyd Davies. He had the only Telephoto news camera at the time.

Those were wonderful years when we had boundless energy and 16 hour days were the norm. It was also about then that we became sailmakers.