The boat company known as Brainard-Bilt produced a line of wooden fishing boats, inboard and outboard runabouts and sailboats in Trumansburg, NY from 1938 – 1941. The business was founded by Fred H. Brainard and Ted Hopkins, of Trumansburg.

 

Fred Brainard enjoyed a very colorful career. As a young man, he tried his hand at Vaudville. He was befriended by Henry Birkett of Penn Yan, owner of Birkett Mills, who helped him obtain employment at a local bank. While the work was steadier, he soon discovered that he was not cut out for a career in banking. Again with the help of Mr. Birkett, he was hired on at the newly formed Penn Yan Boat Company. Within a few weeks he was placed in charge of the mill department, where the parts for all of Penn Yan’s boats were fabricated. He held that position for the next twelve years. Around 1935, he moved on for a two-year stint at the Skaneateles Boats, which was then heavily engaged in building Comet and Snipe sailboats. Following this experience, he worked for the Rochester Boat Works, building training sloops. In 1938 Fred and Ted Hopkins opened a boat shop on Hector Street in Trumansburg.

 

  

 

Fred brought a strong background in boat building to this new business. He personally designed each of the boats offered by Brainard. The design process began with construction of a half-hull model which embodied the desired shape of the boat. Measurements were then taken from the model to generate a table of offsets. Fred then lofted the boat full-size on a lofting table in the shop to provide the information required to build the boat.

 

While Brainard-Bilt specialized in building custom designs, the company also offered a wide variety of standard models including:

  1. Rowing Dinghies (8ft – 12ft)
  2. Sailing Dinghies (8ft – 12ft)
  3. Flat Bottom Rowboats (12ft – 16ft)
  4. Round Bottom Rowboats (12ft – 16ft)
  5. Sailboats (10ft – 16ft, Comets, and Stars on special order)
  6. Outboard Runabouts (14ft & 15ft)
  7. Inboards (powered by 1hp – 5hp air cooled motors)
  8. Inboard Runabouts (powered by 20hp Brennan “Imp” motors)

 

The round bottom boats were carvel-planked with square-edge (not bead & cove) cedar strakes. Steam was used on planks required to take severe bends, as well as on the bent ribs. Planks were fastened to the oak ribs with grooved nails, thereby eliminating the need for clenching. A keel rabbet was eliminated by butting the garboards together, and applying the keel [a keelson] over the top of this seam. A stem rabbet was similarly avoided through use of a stem cap, which covered the face of the inner stem and hood ends of the planking. Stringers (bilge keels) were installed on both the interior and exterior of the hull. A two-piece mahogany transom was used in all of these boats, and the hulls were all hand-caulked. Seats were supported by continuous seat risers, and stabilized with bent oak braces. Spray rails were installed on some boats. A small breast hook in the bow carried a bronze plate identifying the boat’s manufacturer. Brainard fishing boats were painted green on the exterior, and finished “bright” inside or painted gray. Hardware was obtained from a marine supplier. The finished boat contained floor boards, and a pair of oars.

 

 

 

 




 

 

Two types of inboard boats were offered. The smaller models appeared to be 14ft – 16ft round bottom rowboats equipped with air cooled Briggs & Stratton motors. (The outboard version was equipped with a removable hatch cover in the aft deck to accommodate the use of an outboard motor.)  

 

 

Brainard also offered a conventional hard-chine, V-bottom mahogany inboard. This model, designated the Imperial, incorporated a “safety-strut” fixture bolted to the back of the transom which supported the rudder and propeller shaft. (Penn Yan Boats, Inc. offered a remarkably similar inboard of the same name in the early 1930s, which incorporated an identical fixture they developed and called a “safety-strut”.)

 

 

Several stock sailboat models were offered.  The “Waterton Special” was a small, 10ft flat bottom boat marketed for use by children. The standard product line included larger, round bottom sailboats such as the 13 ft “Sheldrake” and the 15 ft “Comet”, a one-design racing sailboat built by several Finger Lakes builders during that era. The popular 23 ft Star sailboat was available by special order for $1275.  

 

 

 

Production records no longer exist for Brainard, but the factory is thought to have produced numerous boats over its three-year history. The shop employed 5-6 people, including Fred, Junior Fred Brainard (Fred’s son), Vince Campbell, Charlie Georgia, Art Millspaw, and Bernie Cronk. Two hulls could be planked in a day’s work. With the exception of one mahogany-planked inboard, a standard line of boats was produced for inventory, and sold directly out of the factory.

 

Brainard ceased production shortly after December 7, 1941 (the attack on Pearl Harbor), as did so many other businesses engaged in work deemed non-essential to the war effort. The shop space was taken over by a man named Goodman, who set up a machine shop. Fred stayed on, working as a machinist until his death in 1947 at age forty-nine.

 

Much of the information in the foregoing article was gleaned from an interview with the late Junior Brainard, conducted by Bruce Hall and Will Schempf  in October, 2003. Haydon R. Brainard, one of Fred’s grandsons, generously shared his collection of catalogs and photos for inclusion in this article and the Museum’s archives. I am indebted to them for sharing this history, and welcome additional information readers may have about Brainard- Bilt boats – Bill Oben