Riva Aquarama wood boat photo

Simply put, the book to have about Riva boats. It was copyrighted / printed in Italy and is now out-of-print. You have to search www.Amazon.com for a used copy. My thought for you? Get one when it is listed for sale as they do not become available all the time.

Riva covers the wood boat era of Riva including the Aquarama, which is to be the featured marque at the Lake Tahoe Antique and Classic Boat Society show this year. That should add value to this book as that is a popular Classic Boat show. The book also covers the Ariston and Super Ariston and why they are different from each other. The book also covers the Florida, SuperFlorida, and Tritone boat models as well.

Some say that until Carlo Riva, a runabout was called a “Chris Craft” like when cellophane tape was called “Scotch Tape” by many. The Chris Craft brand was that strong post-World War II. His boats were the ones to successfully challenge “Chris Craft” as the boat to lust after when the most “carefree” era came forth to the world. He took his family’s boat yard and turned it into a legend after the war.

The boat, the ride, the service, the fellow boat owners all were perceived as the simply the best in the world. The history of Carlo and the Riva boat building yard is all covered in the book. It is one of the main sections within the structure of Roberto Franzoni’s book. While it has copy in English the text is international as other languages are also included. All the rare photos are captioned in three languages also.  Unique styling details are covered in equally rare drawings.

Movie stars were style leaders in the 1950s and they owned Rivas. Brigitte Bardot is shown behind the wheel of one of the several Riva runabouts that she owned. Peter Sellers is shown behind the helm of a Riva and Leslie Caron was photographed peaking out from inside a Riva bow cuddy cabin. Of course, Anita Ekberg was shown in a Riva runabout. That boat had a very special interior finish, by the way. Heads of State, royal families, Saudi Kings and others also are shown in their connection with Riva.

I could go on and on about this book, it is that special, but I will end now. Get one for yourself, if you find one.

Riva Aquarama wood boat photo of the cockpit interior

interior of a Riva wood boat photo

classic wood Riva boat photo

Classic design Stauter Built wood runabout boat photo

Stauter-Built boats is a classic wood boat that often has used the same design as they have for many years.

classic wood boat photo from stauter built

Most are pure open fishing boats. A few are somewhat decked over and are used as a wooden runabout. All use a antique or modern outboard motor for power. They are light and easy to power as they use a shallow draft, almost flat bottom hull design to get performance from low horsepower outboards.

classic wood runabout boat photo

Take a restored classic wooden boat like I show here. Its powered by an old, antique motor. The photos show the loving attention to keeping an old boat, a good, useful boat that is an antique and classic boat show standout. She is mostly a plywood boat, glued and screwed together to take on most waters.

classic wood fishing boat stauter built

I show another Stauter Built boat from their promotional material. It is 151/2’ long and 51/2’ in its beam. It can take up to a 50 Hp. outboard engine and weights in around 425 lbs. It is a Vee shaped bow to cut through the chop coupled with a fairly flat deadrise across the transom boat design. Not a deep vee offshore racer.

She is intended for the waters around Dauphin Island in the Gulf of Mexico, which is roughly 40 miles south of Mobile, AL.

This new wood fishing boat is called the V-bottom Cedar Point Special by Stauter-Built. She maybe a classic in design, but it is too new in its date of manufacture to be an antique boat.

classic wood boat photo of a open fishing runabout outboard

wood boat photo of stauter built runabout fishing model

Classic boats are here along with historic planes and antique cars.  Wood Antique and classic booats as well as race boats are apart of this Florida event.  Enjoy the boats on the water and on land. Ideally, one would enjoy all three (land, sea, and air) in this one event.

Show Hours

Thursday, January 27, 2011
      11am–9pm 

Friday, January 28, 2011 
      11am–9pm 

Saturday, January 29, 2011 
      10am–9pm

Sunday, January 30, 2011 
      10am–5pm

Saturday, October 2, 2010 – after lusting for a ride in a Silver Arrow for 51 years, I got that ride in a perfectly restored one during The Philly Chapter of the ACBS Long Level Show.

The boat was a well-built,heavy craft that shouldered tall wakes out of the picture with the deft hand on the throttle and wheel of the boat’s owner, Dick Hickman. The weather was crisp, the boat was the “looker” on Long Level Lake in PA. and a near life-time year thing was well satisfied. Boy, do I love the ACBS and its two chapter’s in the Philly area and on the Chesapeake Bay. BTW, both Dick and I are members of each chapter.

In case you forgot, a Silver Arrow Chris Craft is a planked boat with a fiberglass deck and an inner bottom of sheet plywood. She uses spruce wood in place of mahogany for planking and set the boating world on its side when she was introduced. Unfortunately, her heavy weight (about 600 lbs extra over a 18 all-wood Chris Craft), pricing (about 25% higher than a 19 ft. Capri), and some new technology (deck to hull joint) only 92 were sold over the two years of its production. And not all of those still exist.

By 1892 he was building a 42 footer and a 50 footer. There was a recession in 1893 and the boat building activity suffered. Then Bill Steinway died in early 1896.

The company then only continued along  for a bit as a non-on-going pace.

Daimler then pretty much threw out what he in engine making and selling and made a deal with a Mr. Jellinek, made a new deal and added the name of Jellinek’s daughter, Mercedes.

credit must be given to the book  Building Chris Craft – inside the factories

by Tony Mollica with Chris Smith ISBN 978 0 7603 3592 5