Phil Bolger, 1927-2009
GALLERY | Click images to enlarge
Philip Bolger took his life yesterday, and poor as I am at eulogies, Philip was a man worth eulogizing. Perhaps the most influential small boat designer in the world, Phil encouraged and inspired a host of would be builders and designers to pick up pencil and paper, plywood and epoxy, and get to work on their dreams. His design attention ranged across the board, and even though his boats were sometimes called homely, it is perhaps only because the viewer hadn’t peered deeply enough to see the mathematical beauty of his parsimonious approach. In that sense, Phil was a devout modernist, and if a cube or a brick made the most sense for a certain vessel, then the eye would soon enough adjust.
Phil even once designed a proa, which appeared in the Jan 1990 edition of Small Boat Journal. In his usual style, the design was original and thought provoking. The rig, a sort of high aspect ratio, fully battened square sail, was a brilliant effort at harmonizing the unique geometry of the proa with the rig, in that it was symmetrical fore and aft, but asymmetrical side to side. The virtues and faults of what has become known as the “Bolger proa rig” has become a source of much discussion and even controversy among proa developers, which in hindsight, perfectly fit the muse of Phil Bolger - Inspiring and controversial.
His death has hit me harder than I would have thought, considering I never met him, and I know I’m not alone. It is curious that a man with no children has left so many “sons”. Fair winds, Philip Bolger.
More here.
