Nathaniel Herreshoff

Nathaniel Herreshoff is famous primarily for his successful designs to defend the America's Cup six consecutive times between 1893 and 1920. Even before that, he patented a catamaran - as early as 1876. He constructed several 30-foot designs. The best-known of these was the AMARYLLIS, which soon earned the title of the fastest yacht afloat. When Herreshoff entered this catamaran in a race, it was so much faster than the monohulls that he was banned from racing it. Sadly, he was discouraged by this, and he gave up his experiments with catamarans.