In 1818 a number of Fermanagh gentlemen set up 'The Subscribers to the Boat races on Lough Erne for the encouragement of Fast Sailing Boats and the Improvement of the Navigation of the Lake'. There is a subsequent and continued history of yacht racing that makes today's Lough Erne Yacht Club the oldest yacht racing club in Ireland. It involved various Big House families, who owned the yachts, and other families, many were employees at the Big Houses, who built the yachts and crewed in them. Big House yacht owners included the following: Saundersons of Castle Saunderson; the Crichtons of Crom Castle, Tippings of Rosferry, Irvines of Rockport, Folliot-Bartons of Waterfoot, the Massey- Beresfords, and the Richardsons of Rossfad. Boat building families, usually also carpenters, included Maguires at Bellisle, Craigs at Crom, Goodwins, and Johnstons, some of whom lived on Lower Lake islands. Ternans on Owl Island, Lower Lake and Cathcarts of the Upper Lake were famous rowing families, as were many who lived on Boa Island, Ireland's largest inland island. Charlie McCabe built numerous racing yachts for the lakes and the sea in Enniskillen in the late 1800s. Johnston is a very common name in present day Fermanagh. It is a long shot, but the Rod Johnstone who built the first of the famous international J/24 keelboats in Connecticut in 1977 believes that his ancestors came from the north of Ireland. May I ask folk on the list seeking out family histories to look out for the yachting connection. Especially in the early 1800s when Fermanagh's population was three times that of today, there was a substantial and active fleet, likewise in the late 1800s. Michael Clarke Historian LEYC Irvinestown