Dundee Boat Company

Dundee Boats was started by Charles L. Wixom in a barn near his residence on Bigelow Avenue in Dundee, NY in 1929. Over the next sixteen years, under his leadership, Dundee Boats turned out thousands of small rowboats and outboard powered boats.

Charlie Wixom was born April 8, 1875 in Italy Hill, NY. His father, a local merchant, died when he was seven. Four years later his mother remarried and the family moved to Hammondsport. There, he attended school with Glen Curtiss. After graduation he worked as a carpenter building barns in the Town of Italy, and dispensed drugs in Smellie’s Drugstore in Hammandsport. Curtiss offered him a job in his new motorcycle factory, and he stayed on as it evolved into airplane manufacture. It was Charlie who crated the motorcycle for shipment to Ormand, Florida where Curtiss drove to a world’s speed record (136.3 mph) in 1907, and who did much of the woodwork on the June Bug in which Curtiss made the first pre-announced, publicly witnessed flight in America, in 1908.

As airplane construction evolved away from wooden framework, Charlie returned to his home in Dundee and started building and repairing boats. By 1929 demand for new boat construction necessitated expansion of his boat shop, and he acquired property previously owned by the Standard Oil Company on Bigelow Avenue, in Dundee, and established his boat factory. Dundee Boats specialized in the construction of sturdy, lightweight fishing boats. The boats were carvel planked with cedar over oak framing. By 1941 the factory occupied 11,800 SF, employed 15-16 workers, and was producing eleven models, including:

¨ Double ended fishing boat (13 feet)

¨ Cottage boat (14 feet)

¨ Sport model (12 feet, strip planked)

¨ Fishing boat w/sliding seat (12 feet)

¨ Deluxe model outboard (16 feet)

¨ Inboard (introduced in 1941)

Dundee boats were sold through a dealer network located in most major cities along the eastern seaboard.

Dundee Boat Factory ca. 1946

In 1945 Charles Wixom sold Dundee Boats to G.F.Thompson and E.R.Kellog of Buffalo. At the time of the sale he confided that he had never owned a boat for his personal use, and hadn't gone fishing since he was ten years old.

Prior to his acquisition of Dundee Boats, Ed Kellogg had been a designer with Curtiss-Wright Corporation, where he helped to design airplanes during WWII. In 1948, Ed became sole owner of the firm, and remained so until 1958 when Gerald and Lawrence Morley became part owners of the corporation.

During the late 1940’s Dundee boats successfully competed in the annual Albany to New

York outboard boat races. In 1948 Ed Clancey of Dundee drove a stock model Cottage Sportsman powered by a 9.7 hp Evinrude motor to a first place victory, covering the 140 mile coarse in 6(hr):51(min):35(sec). Four different Dundee boats were entered among the 200 boats which ran in various classes that year, and all finished the race successfully.

Ed Kellogg

Outboard model boats built by Dundee were a fixture on Seneca Lake. The company supplied the cottage market, as well as local boat liveries such as Getchells. During the 1950’s, construction evolved from strip plank to “Unilam” (moulded plywood). The company purchased molded plywood hulls (“skins”) from large manufacturers, and finished these into the various models offered by Dundee. In 1959 eight different outboard models were being offered. The factory employed up to 18 employees during peak production periods. In February 1959 fire destroyed the 76ft x 200ft main plant of the company. Several boats in various stages of construction were lost, as well as 21 completed boats. By April the company had constructed a new cinder block building to house manufacturing operations.

During the early 1960’s, the boating industry converted rapidly from wood to fiberglass hull construction. While many of the large production builders were able to make this transition, few of the smaller companies could support such a conversion. Consequently, the industry lost the majority of these smaller shops. Early in 1962 the Dundee Boat Company closed their doors for good.

The author is indebted to Pam Miller of the Dundee Area Historical Society and Mary Jo Tomion of the Dundee Public Library who provided background information, including copies of articles previously run in the Dundee Observer on the subject of Dundee Boats. Much of the information contained herein was drawn from those sources. Newell Clancey of Dundee generously provided additional information.

Bill Oben