Manhattan Yacht Club encourages members to increase their skills, knowledge and experiences. Towards this goal, the club has established the Blue Water Society which presents medals to recognize Members who have completed significant ocean voyages.
Each year the MYC Blue Water Society gathers to host the “Blue Water Society Dinner” and to induct new members into the Society.
The next dinner will be February 2024.
In order to be inducted, you must have completed an ocean voyage on a sailboat which included at least one overnight sail out of sight of land that tested your “mettle.”
For an explanation of who qualifies, we refer to this ancient text from the Club’s 2001 website:
If you’ve completed a Newport – Bermuda Race or have delivered a boat back from Bermuda transiting the Gulf Stream, a journey of over four days (unless you were on Playstation and did it in one and a half) you would qualify for induction into the Blue Water Society. If you sailed on a boat from Block Island to Newport stopping overnight in Cuttyhunk for lobster, you would not.
If you sailed overnight along the Jersey coast as part of the club’s old “Great Race,” you would not qualify (because you could have swum safely to shore at any time), but if you sailed overnight from the island of Barbados to the island of Martinique, as several members did in 1994, you would qualify.
However, if during a short trip, say from Block Island to Newport which normally would not qualify, you were cast adrift by a waterspout, blown out into the Atlantic, survived for days on end only on the Merlot, brie and crackers you cleverly stowed in your ditch bag, were subsequently picked up by a Panamanian tanker and taken to the Azores where you finally managed to hitch a ride home, then that’s another story – you would qualify. As you can see, one of the prime ingredients to acceptance is the ability to spin a great yarn.
Final acceptance into the Blue Water Society is only granted by King Neptune. Therefore, if you believe you qualify for induction into the Blue Water Society, please submit details of your blue water experience to office@myc.org.
All Blue Water Society Members are recognized and honored at a special dinner every winter. New Society Members are also inducted at this dinner. Each new inductee is required to give a speech detailing the experience which qualified them for admission to the Blue Water Society.
Photo: Some of the attendees at the Blue Water Society dinner at El Quijote in February 2016.
Photo: The Blue Water Society Dinner in February 2015 at the India House. Special thanks for John Elliott for organizing this dinner.
Photo: February 2014 Blue Water Society Dinner at El Quijote.
Photo: February 2012 Blue Water Society Dinner at El Quijote.
Photo: February 2011 Blue Water Society Dinner at El Quijote.
Current Blue Water Society Members (Year Inducted)
(list in formation now, if you were previously inducted, please inform office@myc.org)
Jean-Yves Noblet
John Elliott
Michael Fortenbaugh
John LaGrassa
Hal Dorfman (1997)
Katie Morgan
Mike McCarty (2016)
John Laskas (2016)
JoAnna Laskas (2016)
John Carlson
Kerry Dunn (2017)
Alex Howarth (2017)
Bob Bestwick (2017)
Tracy Aron (2017)
Doug Moreland (2017)
Simon Jones (2017)
Jason Corall (2017)
Glen Burger (2018)
Patty Bryan (2018)
Thomas Helck (2018)
Bob Finkelstein (2018)