23/03/2016
Death of Ian Bruce, father of the Laser
Ian Bruce, honorary life member of the Royal St. Lawrence Yacht Club in Montreal, passed away on March 21, 2016 at his daughter’s home in Hamilton, Ontario after a courageous battle with cancer. Well known Canadian designer, boat builder and championship sailor, Ian Bruce, has died at the age of 83. Ian always modestly billed himself as an industrial designer, but he became to be known as the “Father of the Laser”; perhaps the world's most successful high performance dinghy ever.
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, before moving to Nassau, Bahamas after the Second World War, Bruce was sent to boarding school in Port Hope, Ontario at Trinity College by his family as a teenager.
From there, he moved to Montreal to attend McGill University to study engineering. While there one summer, Bruce received a call from his good buddy, Bermuda born, Montreal resident Kirk Cooper, asking for a favour. Cooper, a sailor, was scheduled to sail an International 14 in a nearby regatta.
Quoting from an interview with Ian a few years ago: “Cooper said, 'My crew is sick and can't sail with me. You're from the Islands, you must know how to sail. Ever raced?' ". The answer was no. " 'Kirk, I'm a hell of a spearfisherman,' ", said Bruce, who found sailing "boring" as a kid. "Kirk said, 'That's good enough.' So I went to the Pointe Claire (Quebec) regatta with him and it changed my life. I fell head over heels in love with the sport."
It also took Bruce a while to find his calling in the design business. After his first year at McGill, Bruce had a choice to specialize in an engineering discipline or architecture. The latter appealed to Bruce, but his father persuaded him to focus on engineering.
"The first year, I got straight A's," Bruce said. "The fourth year, I got straight F's. I never finished engineering."
So Bruce went on to land a job at Alcan before returning to university in Syracuse, NY to complete industrial design studies.
With that degree in hand, Bruce came back to Montreal to join an industrial design firm.
"I started building International 14's as a hobby," Bruce said. "All of a sudden, the hobby started consuming me. I decided to give it up unless I could get a boat mass-produced that I could make a living out of."
That boat was the Laser. He came up with the concept and discussed it with friend and fellow Canadian Bruce Kirby, who sketched the boat. The rest is history.
"I was going to build 400 boats and retire," Bruce said. Well it didn't quite turn out that way. Originally intended to be simply a car-topper, recreational sailboat, it quickly became the most popular singlehanded racing class worldwide. At its peak, Bruce's company was putting together 12,000 boats in a year.
Performance Sailcraft had its beginnings in 1960 when Ian returned from sailing a Finn in the Olympics and sub-contracted the building of the Newport Finn in Canada under license. Then, in 1967, he finished his own International 14 from an English shell, built the first successful lightweight, self-depowering rig and went on to win two successive Prince of Wales Trophies, then emblematic of the I-14 World Championship.
He and a friend then decided to get together to build more affordable 14s for the Canadian market and the Company was born. They built the Kirby Mk lll and Mk V International Fourteens and obtained the first license to build the new Australian designed Contender. But it was all being done as an exhausting, after hours hobby while the partners pursued their regular day jobs. They decided to close it down unless they could build a mass produced boat and turn it into a business. That boat was the Laser. Within three years Ian had opened majority-owned Performance Sailcraft production plants in eight countries and a licensee in California.
In addition to competing in the 1960 Olympics in the Finn class, Ian also represented Canada in the Star at the 1972 Games in Kiel, Germany.
During 40 years in the business he either designed or assisted in the design, developed and built 12 different ISAF classes and over 120,000 boats, including: Finn, 14, Contender, Laser, Optimist, Fireball, 470, Laser II, Tasar, Laser Radial, Byte, Club 420s, Bytes and the 29er. In the last instance he was part of a team assisting Julian Bethwaite in the development of the 29er, providing his product design knowledge and his sailing experience. His own design, the BYTE, was the male and female singlehanded boat used in the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore. In more recent years Ian designed and built custom power boats, including the Bruce 22; a 1940's classic style, all-electric drive runabout.
In 2009 Ian was appointed to the Order of Canada, the nation's highest honour. The award was in recognition of his service to sailing, both in Canada and Internationally, and in particular for his involvement in the design and development of high-performance boats for young sailors.
Ian was without a doubt a mentor to many young sailors and a great friend to many, many sailors around the planet. He will be remembered for his passion for the development of the sport and youth sailing.
Article written by Andy Roy , Chairman of the North American laser class
EurILCA and all the Lasers sailors adress their sincere condolence in this sad moment to Ian Bruce family.
