Most likely part of the spectator fleet at the 1929 NZPBA championship races held on the Whau River, upper Waitemata.
Help needed to ID the launches.
Harold Kidd Update:
The really beautiful launch in the foreground is very like ROMANCE II in style and layout so that I’m pretty sure she’s Bailey & Lowe. The “break” is further aft and the clerestory detail is slightly different from R2. I think she could be MANU. A higher res image might help in picking up the letter in the roundel under the sheer belting at the bow and to see whether or not she has any foliate carving at the bow.
25/06 – Not MANU. If not by Bailey & Lowe, she’s a direct copy of ROMANCE II except for the break in the sheer and the positioning of the ports. She is also very like the 32 footer ROTOMAHANA they built for A.B. Donald in 1923, but again the details of the break and the ports differ slightly and I think she’s at least a 36 footer.
I’m really scratching my head on this one.
Discover more from waitematawoodys.com #1 for classic wooden boat stories, info, advice & news - updated daily - 14+ million views
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
waitematawoodys.com #1 for classic wooden boat stories, info, advice & news - updated daily - 14+ million views 
Your sense of humour shineth forth Harold
LikeLike
There were lots of JEANS……….Levis, for example
LikeLike
Not the Jean recent of ‘mystery boat’ though?? substantial porthole and foredeck alterations if so?
LikeLike
Well done Nathan, you are 100% right!
She’s ROSEMARY M now but was JEAN at the time of this pic in 1929 when owned by Sam Leyland (see p93 “Vintage NZ Launches”,copies available at Boat Books, and see my blather on W.J. Quelch re DOROTHY below). Built by T.M. Lane & Sons in 1915 as ROTHESAY.
LikeLike
Two years later, isn’t it Rosemary M?
The back left boat is the one from the recent Henderson Creek photos… I really like the boat right centre
LikeLike
The launch in the background (centre) is ADELAIDE V, Collings & Bell 1924. In service at Taupo in 2013 as ADELAIDE (photo to follow).
LikeLike
That’s not a port light at all. It’s a medallion with the boat’s initial on it, an affectation of many Auckland launches in the period 1914-30. My opinion right now is that she’s Dr. G C Long’s MARO (ex ISLAY, ex THISTLE, ex LADY MARGARET(I)) Long was a prominent member of the NZPBA. He would have been at this exciting NZPBA outboard and speedboat event which was something of a departure for the club and an event to cater for the outboard racing craze that was sweeping the world at the time. As it turned out, the venue up the Whau Creek was pretty awful and outboard racing soon moved to the Panmure Basin where, of course, there was no access for displacement craft. The outboard people then set up their own club, the Auckland Outboard Racing Club.
This launch is a typical Auckland-built launch of 1918-28 and nothing like the output of Cox & Filmer who built launches a couple of generations of style later than this beauty.
LikeLike
Quite unusual to have the single port light below the sheer line forward. This is similar to what was used on the Connie V built by Cox & Filmer in 1935. See https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/05/01/robin-gay-connie-v/
I wonder whether the launch shown was one of theirs?
LikeLike
Not MANU. If not by Bailey & Lowe, she’s a direct copy of ROMANCE II except for the break in the sheer and the positioning of the ports. She is also very like the 32 footer ROTOMAHANA they built for A.B. Donald in 1923, but again the details of the break and the ports differ slightly and I think she’s at least a 36 footer.
I’m really scratching my head on this one.
LikeLike