About Clarity

Now 102 years old, Clarity has a unique story to tell and a life which provides testimony to her resilience. She was one of four sister designs by Wm. Fife (number 722) and was built by Thornycroft for William Vett of Copenhagen to compete in the 1924 Olympic Summer Games in Le Havre. Sailing against seven other European and one Cuban yacht, Vett and his crew Knud Degn and Christian Moller won a coveted silver medal.

After the '24 Olympics, Clarity participated in the 1926 Scandinavian Gold Cup, but was soon sold to Jens Jespersen, a master cabinetmaker in Copenhagen and one of the founders of the Kastrup Sejlklub (a yacht club 50 km. west of Copenhagen), who sailed her through the 1930's and 40's. It is believed that her enclosed cabin, which she still proudly sports, was designed and installed by Jens during this period. This would make sense, given its low, sleek lines inconsistent with more mid‐century cabins typically fitted to a yacht of her size.

Jed Pearsall discovered Clarity in Maine in 1981, and her home port has been Mystic, CT and Newport, RI since then. She competed in the 2009 6-Meter Worlds in Newport as the only previous Olympic medal winner, and was honored as the "Most Historic Yacht" in the fleet.