CBYRA & John Kramer

Early Racing History

 

The Chesapeake 20's raced in Annapolis from the year 1938 through 1969.  C-20s raced in CBYRA High Point from 1941 to 1970.  The class was suspended after 1970 because of insufficient members, seven were required.  They had a dispute with CBYRA whether to count boats or different skippers who may participate in same boat.  When dropped from CBYRA, they were also dropped from Annapolis Yacht Club Regatta (held each year in early July) where they had participated since 1938 which ended in 1970.  As a result, C-20s did not continue with Margaret Hoffman race between WRSC and Annapolis to participate in the Annapolis Yacht Club regatta.  C-20s had raced the Margaret Hoffman regatta for 32 years since 1938.  John Kramer in Stormy won the CBYRA High Point trophies in 1968 and 1969, and his longtime crew, Joe Atwell in 1970.  John Kramer also won the high point in 1957 but it was not awarded since he was not a member of a CBYRA member club.  He listed Andews Air Force as his club since he was in the Air Force and stationed there.

 

Andrew A. Kramer, father of John, Neal, Vincent and Andrew Kramer, had Dick Hartge come to his bank in Washington.  He told Dick Hartge that he needed to get serious about Chesapeake 20s and provided him a check to built 20 boats @ $650 each.  Andrew Kramer sold 20s in 1941 from the Annapolis Yacht Sales.

 

Andrew Kramer bought Sea Witch II, Myray (a chine 20) and later Stormy in 1940.  He gave Stormy to his son, John Kramer.   Sea Witch 2 was bought from Albert Ball and raced by Vincent Kramer.  Vincent Kramer died after WWII in an F-80 crash in Germany.  His brother, Neal, sailed Serenade.  Stormy raced as 00 and Serenade as 000.

 

John Kramer built two models of Stormy.  The larger one (2.5 inches to the foot) was a radio controlled boat; and other at 1 inche to the foot is a regular model.  He was an excellent model builder and both models are very exact.  He donated both models to the Chesapeake 20 Association.   He also did lots of models of aircraft (he was a navigator in bombers during the war) which he donated to the boy scouts in Naples, Fl..  He also encouraged Dick Hartge to do a model of Seawitch (which he said was not to scale).   The scale model of Stormy is now in position of Ted Weihe and the Chesapeake 20 Class Association.  John asked his former crew, Joe Atwell, to pick up the model for the association.  Joe and John raced together since they were teenagers.  Joe lives in Annapolis.  John Kramer was buried in Arlington Cemetary in April 2009.