How it began
According to the Cayman Islands history Founded upon the Seas, the first Caymanian catboat was devised in 1904 by Daniel Jervis, a turtling captain and boat builder on Cayman Brac, as a vessel for pursuing turtle. The National Gallery of the Cayman Islands gives the date as 1905. Catboats as a general type, with a single mast set far forward, are not unique to Cayman and had existed in other countries for more than 200 years. The Caymanian catboat is a local design within that family.
How it works
The typical catboat had a beam one-fourth of its length from stem to stern and carried a single mast. Local variants developed: the bilge, the point where the side bends toward the bottom, sits higher on the Cayman Brac boat than on the Grand Cayman one. The boats were painted blue so that they blended into the water and turtlers could get closer to their prey. Leftover blue mixed with white was used for the inside.
What changed first
Caymanian turtlers had worked from dugout canoes. Jervis's model was such a clear improvement over the dugout that builders copied it on all three islands. The catboat became an integral part of the turtling industry. It was also used to carry cargo between districts before trucks were common, and a boat's arrival was announced by blowing a conch shell.
Where it stands today
The Cayman Catboat Club has reintroduced old-style racing, and the boats are still built and sailed. In 2011 the Cayman Islands Postal Service issued six stamps on the catboat, showing turtling, cargo carrying, boat building, sail sewing and racing, as the third issue in its cultural series.
