Chris Smith built his first boat in 1874 at the age of 13 in Algonac, Michigan. It was a simple lake boat for duck hunting, but demonstrated an extraordinary natural talent for working with wood. It wasn’t long before Chris and his brother Hank began building a succession of wooden boats. By the beginning of the 20th Century, Chris Smith’s reputation had begun to spread.

   At about the same time that Henry Ford starting making cars, Chris Smith began to build speed boats. Experimenting with a variety of hull and gasoline engine combinations, Smith realized that powered boats needed an entirely new type of hull design to ensure efficient movement through water.

   Smith started to produce a succession of innovative designs. Bitten by the speed bug, his quest for speed led to the achievement of considerable racing success. Winning the American Power Boat Association Gold Cup six years running, Smith’s revolutionary designs broke record after record. Indeed, Smith was so successful that competition rules had to be changed to give other racers a chance.
Between the two world wars, Chris Smith began to produce boats that offered great comfort as well as supreme performance. They were nick-named Chris-Crafts, both as a mark of respect and affection. The leisure boating market grew so strongly that by 1927 Chris-Craft was the world’s largest manufacturer of mahogany boats.

Chris Smith died in 1939, but his son Jay proved to be an equally able builder of boats and the company continued to flourish. Contributing to the war effort, Chris-Craft built more than 10,000 landing craft. On June 6th, 1944, Chris-Craft LCPLS spearheaded the D-Day landings. To this day, Chris-Craft remains the only recreational boat manufacturer to have its boats tested under fire.

After World War II, Chris-Craft recommenced commercial boat production with renewed vigor. By 1959, Chris-Craft had 10 factories and more than 5,000 employees. Leadership of the company passed to Chris Smith’s grandson, Harsen. When interviewed by Time magazine, he attributed Chris-Craft’s success to the family rather than any individual within it.

The story of Chris-Craft is the story of the American dream. In the 130 years since the company has been in existence, it has built more than 250,000 boats. Countless families have experienced the innovation and quality that are Chris-Craft hallmarks, not just in the US, but across the world.

Chris Smith’s legacy is an approach to building boats that combines craftsmanship with efficiency, beauty with practicality, performance with comfort, style with elegance, reliability with longevity, traditional with modern, and most importantly, quality with innovation.

Please take a look at our inventory of Chris Craft boats at https://www.mahoganybay.net/product-category/boats/chris-craft/ to see classic examples of these beautiful boats that are available for ownership. Or, browse https://www.mahoganybay.net/photos/ for historic documents created by Chris Craft.