History of Puppeteers
In 1982, when the Squib fleet was flourishing in Howth, David Lovegrove decided that it was time for a change of boats as with two daughters, who wanted to sail with their parents, a Squib was not big enough.
At that time, David was sailing with a crew of three; himself, his wife Kate and Damian Jennings.
Coincidentally, Damian was also thinking of branching out and getting his own boat, being in much the same situation, having three children who also wanted to sail. A number of boats were reviewed and the choice was narrowing down to either a J24 or a Ruffian.
At that time David was Sailing Secretary and received a letter from a boat builder in Northern Ireland – Chris Boyd – asking permission of the Club to bring down his Puppeteer 22 to display it at Howth. It was agreed to accommodate his request and the Club offered him a marina berth for the weekend and advertised the dates of his visit.
On the due date, Chris, along with the Puppeteer on a trailer, arrived.
David, having made the arrangements for his visit, somehow felt responsible for trying to get people to view the boat. The boat was available on the marina and a few people visited it on the Saturday, but no real interest was displayed. David was racing his Squib on Saturday and met Chris in the Club in the evening, at which time Chris expressed disappointment at the lack of interest in the boat.
In order to help the situation, David said that he would take the boat out for a trial sail on the Sunday morning and would try to promote more interest. He contacted Damian and told him about the Puppeteer and suggested that he take out the boat for a sail.
On the Sunday morning David only had a short time free and was limited to about 30 minutes in the boat. However, this 30 minutes convinced him that this was the boat for him. It met all his requirements and handled like a dinghy. Damian also took the boat out and similarly agreed that it was the one for him.
Subsequently, David (Snow Goose) and Damian (Sanderling) got together and along with Robin Chillingworth (Gannet) and Tim Chillingworth (Ibis) placed an order in September for four Puppeteer Mark 2 kits.
The first boat was collected in November and trailed down to Howth. And that was the beginning of the Howth Puppeteer fleet, which today numbers over 30 boats!
However, all was not plain sailing.
Gerry Sargent followed with the purchase of Toucan in January ‘83 and Tony O’Sullivan purchased Ghosty Ned from Scotland in April ‘83 bringing the fleet up to six boats, just sufficient to qualify for a start. For the first year, the Puppeteers had sailed on Saturdays as part of Cruisers 3 and were handicapped out of existence. No sooner was a class start gained, than David went to work in Thailand for a year. During his absence, the Sailing Committee decided to remove the start from the class on the basis that it did not have the minimum six boats entered.
It was only after an impassioned plea from Bangkok to Andrew Knowles, the then Chairman of the Sailing Committee, that the class was allowed to keep its start, despite only having five boats entered. The next year David returned from Thailand and the class started to grow.
And the rest as they say is history.