Danforth - Gitana Cup is Saturday

Excerpt from The Waterline in 2010:

“Spencer Evans thinks the time may be ripe for some background on the Danforth Cup scheduled for July 17th: One summer day in 1951, Dick Danforth, developer of the Danforth anchor, and his wife Johnny, sailed into Blue Hill Harbor aboard his sloop Gitana, an Alden Explorer that listed her home port as Berkeley, California. That seemed a pretty exotic home port for a yacht anchoring in Blue Hill in those days. Naturally, she and her owner attracted some attention even after it became known that she was trucked, not sailed, to the east coast. Still, Gitana was also known to have performed commendably in several Honolulu races prior to her move east and her owner certainly had that look of an experienced, old salt. The Danforths spent several summers living aboard Gitana before they bought land and built a house on Blue Hill Harbor's eastern shore between the Becton property and Sid Coggan's house. Dan, as he was called, and Johnny immersed themselves in the Kollegewidgwok Yacht Club  scene. One year he gave lessons in celestial navigation aboard Gitana for the Club's offshore dreamers. He was the key mover behind establishing a two day race for auxiliaries to Burntcoat Harbor on Swans Island and return that became the Nevin Cup. He was ever the enthusiastic competitor and never missed a race. Not long after his death in 1960, the Club established a July day race for auxiliaries in his honor, adding a trophy for the smaller, “Class B” participants named for his boat, the Gitana Cup. Similarly, a Danforth Cup Series was established in San Francisco Bay in his memory. There was a brief time when the Danforth Cup was folded into a Gulf of Maine series of offshore  races and became an overnight race from Blue Hill to Mt Desert Rock and return. Although well subscribed because the GMORC series was popular, the Club Council decided it did not want the expense or the responsibility of running such a race and it returned to its  Blue Hill Bay day race format. Unlike his high tensile anchors, tact was not one of Dan’s strengths but he was an experienced offshore sailor and he freely gave excellent counsel in the art of offshore boat handling for Club members wishing it.”