Hydroplane History
We are here to celebrate unlimited hydroplane racing, with particular emphasis on the "Golden Age" of the '50's and '60's.
This is the new site for Hydroplane History which has been located at www.lesliefield.com. All the material from the old site is being updated and recoded to modern web standards.
In addition, lots more articles and stats, previously unseen, will be added.
Finally, this will be a showcase for hydroplane related video, both from my personal collection and from partnership with other hydro enthusiasts.
NOTE: This site is still in development and many of the sections are not yet filled. The rollout should be complete by some time late in 2024 (or so . . .).
UPDATES (most recent first):
June 27, 2024
Resuming updates on this website: I've been dealing with a costly computer failure and the lengthy rebuild. As well, I've been scanning my large collection of race programmes which will uploaded and separately searchable. This will happen over the next few months. Stats for races will be updated and other content added.
February 26, 2023
Update race results, descriptions and videos through the end of 2022. 7205 pages total with several hundred new video links. Will be adding many photos to fill out previous posts.
June 16, 2022
Totally updated and reformatted Boats by Name - Table and Boats by Hull Number - Table pages. Links to Details pages are provided from the latter section as available. There are now 7132 pages on the website.
June 6, 2022
Completed a thorough spellcheck of the entire website. Added hundreds of new pages (now 7116 text pages on the website). Started work on a new section called Details which provide a comprehensive illustrated documentation of details and evolution of hundreds of hulls in our sport's history. This section will start to go public in mid-June 2022.
July 8, 2021
Major project of in-depth coverage of all races in 1960 (completed over months of solid work). Many pages running to several 10's of thousands of words plus hundreds of images (photos, tables, covers and other artwork). Future projects will be as in-depth as this).
Site was re-indexed, revealing some 6872 pages of text, more than a 5200 images and several thousand videos.
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March 2, 2021
Added hundreds of additions to the Personalities section -- bios and features about various personalities of the sport. Nearly every entry carries a photo of the subject. Many more bios also to be added.
http://hydroplanehistory.com/personalities/
There is now a total of 6751 pages of text on the website; thousands more to follow.
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November 7, 2020
Completed a huge project (inspired by Bob Moore) of the 1949 National Sweepstakes at Red Bank. Reviewed hundreds of source documents. Added 35 pages of text and 41 photos.
http://hydroplanehistory.com/races/1949_national_sweepstakes_expect_500_boat_entries.html
(Remember to use the [Select related article . . .] dropdown to access all the other pages in the project)
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September 21, 2020
1954 International Cup, 1955 Fite Memorial, 1955 Maple Leaf Trophy, 1955 Detroit Memorial, 1955 International Boundary, 1955 Copper Cup; 1955 Silver Cup and 1955 Mapes Trophy added. Dozens of pages and many photos. 6488 pages in all on the website.
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August 20, 2020
Extensive coverage of 1954 Mapes Mile-High Gold Cup and 1954 Salton Sea Regatta. 6379 pages in all.
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August 3, 2020
Fleshed out many files from 1946 forward. Added many more race videos, race descriptions and photographs. Starting to add groups of photos as photo gallleries (this will be a lengthy process, to see examples search for "Photo Gallery"). Also added photos of programme guides; search for "Programme Guide"). 6320 pages in all.
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April 9, 2020
Many files added or corrected but the main focus has been adding race videos from the decade 1990-1999. 351 videos added. [Next up: 1980-1989]. Now a total 6132 pages on the website.
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February 7, 2020
Last October I posted a page of links to video files for the decade 2010-2019. In the months since I've spent hundreds of hours preparing a similar page for the decade prior [2000-2009].
Understandably this was much more challenging -- source material was harder to find, extensive re-editing was required for most vids, etc. In spite of this, videos were created for nearly every race for that decade(!).
In most cases race reports and extensive statistics are grouped with each video.
More than 762 video links for 2000-2009. (This is for video material both from my personal collection as well as extensive links to other online video.)
Now a total of 6028 pages on the Hydroplane History website.
[Next up: 1990-1999].
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October 23, 2019
Finished creating links for videos of all races 2010-2019 -- more than 4000(!) video links, just for that decade. (This is for video material from both my personal collection as well as extensive links to other online video.) [Next up: 2000-2009]. Now a total of 5959 pages on the website. Videos 2000-2019
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October 10, 2019
Added links to hundreds of race videos 2013-2019: Primary race links pages. 5928 pages total on website.
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September 10, 2019
Additional race accounts and stats from 2014 and 2015 have been added. Many dozens of videos are now integrated into race accounts for the last several years -- hundreds more to come. A new dedicated video links page will be created in a month or so. 5914 pages total on the website.
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August 1, 2019
Additional race accounts and stats from 2012 and 2013 have been added. 5688 pages total on the website.
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July 3, 2019
Additional race accounts and stats from 2010 and 2011 have been added. 5623 pages total on the website.
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June 14, 2019
Additional race accounts and stats from 2009 and 2010 have been added. 5571 pages total on the website.
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June 1, 2019
The last few months have been spent processing raw material and now uploading has resumed. Race accounts and stats from 2007 and 2008 jave been fleshed out. 5497 pages total on the website.
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January 25, 2019
Coverage now fairly complete 1903-2018. Further revisions will include more detailed race descriptions 2007 to present. After that many thousands of photographs, and eventually videos, will be added.
5400 pages total on the website -- an addition of more than 1100 pages since the end of the 2018 racing season.
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December 23, 2018
Stats now complete from 1903-2001. Next up: revisions and additions 2002-present; also,filling in race descriptions, photos, hull histories and . . .
5120 pages total on website.
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November 15, 2018
Stats now complete from 1903-1992; good coverage 2000-present, leaving only 1993-1999 with a gap in stats. Next up filling in race descriptions, photos, hull histories and . . .
4802 pages total on website.
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October 19, 2018
Statistics complete from 1903-1979 (substantial stats after that). Stats proofread and unified in format 1903-1969.
4743 pages total on the website. Next up: filling in gaps in stats and bringing pages after 1969 into standardized format.
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October 4, 2018
Statistics completely filled in from 1903 through 1934. Many race descriptions article add from that period. More complete race descriptions and images to follow eventually. Now a total of 4538 pages on the website.
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September 8, 2018
Filling in many more races, at least with statistics; complete up through 1922. A total of 4255 pages, in all. Will probably continue to fill in, methodically, toward the post-WWII races (which have pretty good coverage).
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August 18, 2018
Many more pages added for 1908 and 1909. Added complete stats for 1903 and 1904. Will now add stats for 1905 through 1909. Then will move on to later race descriptions and many pages for the biographical section. 3884 pages total.
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August 9, 2018
Many pages from 1907 added, 3673 pages total.
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August 1, 2018
A couple hundred more pages in Early Races, most race descriptions of 1903-1906 competions. Photos there to be added later. Working forward towards the present. 3582 pages total.
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July 15, 2018
More pages added to Other; many additions to Records (under Races). 3370 pages total.
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July 7, 2018
More pages added to Other; many additions to Records (under Races). 3239 pages, 2359 images total.
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June 27, 2018
Added many pages in Other section; tables for boats by name or number. Total pages 3041.
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June 14, 2018
Added more than 100 pages in the Personalities section (including a photo gallery of Mira Slovak), a new section of Records (under the Races Tab).
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June 6, 2018
Lots of new pages from 2000-2018; many galleries of photos. Now up to a total of 2885 pages
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May 18, 2018
First upload of the year but with it added many hundreds of new articles and photos. Now up to a total of 2777 pages. Added a large block of articles and photos for 2011-2018. Next block planned: 1990-2010.
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October 2, 2017
Continuing the 1946-1948 fills and photos. Up to to a total of 2046 pages.
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September 19, 2017
Filling in many new pages and adding photos, especially 1946-1948. Up to to a total of 1986 pages.
Focussing on 1946 to 1950 right now; will subsequently move on to 1951 through 1989 adding new pages and filling with photos along the way. After that adding new pages from 1990+.
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July 19, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1989 now uploaded, a total of 1875 pages.
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July 11, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1988 now uploaded, a total of 1760 pages.
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June 30, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1987 now uploaded, a total of 1604 pages.
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June 21, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1986 now uploaded, a total of 1488 pages.
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March 28, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1979 now uploaded, a total of 1200 pages.
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February 18, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1973 now uploaded, a total of 1045 pages.
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January 31, 2017
Articles and stats for races through 1967 now uploaded, a total of 874 pages.
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January 17, 2017
Articles and statistics covering races from 1946 through 1962 have been entered -- more than 700 pages (!). Right now, this is text only -- photographs and other images will be added later.
Go to Races --> 1946-1949, Races --> 1950-1959, Races --> 1960-1969 etc. from the dropdown menu above (or simply click on these links). There you will see pages of links to individual races.
For coverage that includes more than one article you will see a Select Related Article . . . dropdown option that will take you to the other pages.
Much of this material is coming over from the old Hydroplane History website (www.lesliefield.com) but it also includes considerably more statistics. Every page has been reformatted and brought up to current coding standards.
After the transfer and updating of old files is complete (some time in the next few months) I'll start adding some of the thousands of additional articles, photographs and video I have yet to ready for uploading.