Good Old Boat Issue 142: Jan/Feb 2022

Across the Bar: Ted Brewer

BY KAREN LARSON

F rom the day back in 1998 that Ted Brewer mistook me for an old friend, my husband, Jerry Powlas, and I have had a warm and special rela- tionship with him. At the time there was a sailor/publisher in Ontario named karin larson (her lowercase spelling, not mine). Unbeknownst to us and long before Jerry and I started Good Old Boat , she had started

a successful regional sailing magazine called GAM on Yachting . But, as the editor of a sailing magazine that had not even been published yet, I was hopeful when I called Ted and left a message asking him to serve on our editorial board. This was a purely advisory position, since we believed we could never hope to ask for more.

Ted, thinking I was the other karin larson, returned the call full of his signature bubbly enthusiasm and said he’d be delighted...and how were things in Ontario? Once we straightened out the misunderstanding, Ted said he’d be happy to work with us. I don’t need to remind you of the wonderful boat designs by Ted Brewer, the Brewer Bite, his Comfort Ratio, or the books he authored on sailboat design. Others can—and have—told these tales (See “A Stand-Up Draftsman,” July/August 2020). Instead, I want to focus on the personal Ted Brewer and his long and positive relationship with Good Old Boat . Ted’s name did indeed appear as a member of the editorial board starting with our first issue. By the third issue we published a profile of Ted written by John Vigor. We were still too timid to ask Ted to write for us, but we needed his expertise. We had started a series, focused on good old boats and their sailors. These features could use the addition of technical insight, but we didn’t have the background to review every sailboat. We were the sailors of a good old boat, not experts on design. We asked Ted to give us a technical review of Robert Perry’s Baba 30. A day later, an article appeared on our fax machine, and before we had a chance to read it, Ted called to ask, “How’d you like what I wrote? Do you want more?” We did. That led to 50 more sailboat comparisons, 35 technical articles on every- thing from stability and galley layout to sail plans and rating rules—and an ongoing friendship. Ted offered us the use of his boat, a 24-foot Nimble Nomad, to explore British Columbia if we could arrange to visit (who does that for perfect strangers?). He and his wife, Betty, frequently drove from the West Coast to visit family in Ontario, and they visited us in Minnesota a couple of times on their way through.

A professional photo of Ted taken for one of his three books on boat design.

44

GoodOldBoat.com