J. Murray Watts

A Philadelphia naval architect whose office burned, and whose surviving plans reached Mystic Seaport by a roundabout route. One of his gillnetter designs, published in Yachting in 1948, was built in Richmond, California over fourteen years.

Archive

After a fire destroyed his office, Watts's surviving plans passed to Carter & Wittholz and were donated to Mystic Seaport by Charles W. Wittholz — described there as the most comprehensive collection of his extant plans

Bay connection

Gold Star (1960) was built from Watts blueprints for a gaff-rigged, bowsprit-less gillnetter published in Yachting in 1948

• 1948Gillnetter schooner design — published in Yachting; built as Gold Star by George Krenkel