Lübecker Yacht-Club and Segler-Club Hansa: Verein des Kaisers and Verein der Arbeiter - two anniversaries in Lübeck
Ursula Meer
· 15.08.2023
They are imposing racing schooners with wide overhangs that set sail across the Kiel Fjord and the Bay of Lübeck in the 1880s. They were gems of the open keelboat class, whose owners competed in races and performed many a daring manoeuvre with their yachts, which tended to be over-rigged. Kaiser Wilhelm II, who was passionate about seafaring in general and sailing in particular throughout his life, was also a frequent guest at the first sporting regattas of aristocrats and wealthy citizens on German waters with his "Meteor" - as was his wife Auguste Viktoria with her "Iduna". From 1889 onwards, he regularly took part in the Kieler Woche as commodore of the local Imperial Yacht Club, and from 1894 onwards he also visited Travemünde.
There, five years earlier, a small race between two Hamburg merchants for a bottle of Lübeck Rotspon developed into a regatta event with more and more participants under Hamburg's direction in the following years. Wilhelm II calls on the citizens of Lübeck to actively participate in sailing and in particular in the organisation of the Travemünde Week. The first ordinary general meeting on 30 August 1898 in Lübeck's town hall marks the foundation of the Lübeck Yacht Club, whose statutes have since firmly established the organisation of the Travemünde Week as one of the club's purposes.
The workers also want to sail
However, according to the thinking of the upper sailing class at the time, the Emperor's invitation to the "citizens of Lübeck" excludes all those who earn their money with their own labour; the "common people" are onlookers and may please remain so. Sailing as a pastime was the new fashion, freshly imported from England. The racing yachts, individually designed according to the owner's wishes, can swallow up huge sums of money, and the supporting programme, including an imperial breakfast, requires the right wardrobe.
The social strata are conceivably impermeable. But the working people will not allow themselves to be banned from sailing
The social strata are conceivably impermeable. The working classes, however, did not allow themselves to be banned from sailing, they did it in their own way. Not that the workers at the turn of the century had time to pass in the true sense of the word; their working week consisted of six days with at least 60 hours of often hard labour. However, this did not stop five Lübeck workers from founding their own association. They claimed their place on the regatta courses and waters - and with 27 August 1898 as the founding date of their Sailing Club Hansa, founded for the "promotion of sailing and water sports and the socialising of its members", they were even just ahead of the LYC.
LYC and SCH initially go their separate ways
Like twins separated at birth, the two clubs have since gone their separate ways. They sail close together on boats of different qualities and, despite the geographical proximity of their clubhouses on the Wakenitz and on Lake Ratzeburg, meet rather sporadically on the courses or in organisational teams. In the founding years, the desire for demarcation seems to determine the character of both clubs and is only cancelled out when sailing becomes a popular sport.
The handful of SCH members initially made do with disused lifeboats, quickly fitted with a mast, boom and canvas, or open, self-built dinghies on the Wakenitz microregion. Their club home is a pub on Lübeck's Dorotheenstraße, the small fleet is moored to buoys and later to a raft close to the banks of the Wakenitz. Boat classes are still unknown, and without regulations on standardised dimensions, sail areas or remuneration systems, they compete with other clubs - sometimes with adventurous constructions such as outriggers in the form of a plank protruding over the side of the boat to compensate for extreme over-rigging. In winter, they pull the boats onto a meadow next to the pub.
The LYC already had 80 members when it was founded. At the turn of the century, the Travemünde marina was expanded and still provides berths for the club's sea-going yachts today. Its inland sailors are given a boathouse on the Leuchtenfeld, later on the Wakenitz and on Lake Ratzeburg.
The LYC also discovers the Wakenitz and Lake Ratzeburg
At the beginning of the 1920s, the LYC invited dinghy owners returning from the Kiel and Travemünde Weeks to familiarise themselves with the scenic and sailing beauties of the Wakenitz and Ratzeburger See area, which until then had rarely been visited. "Four centuries have passed without major changes to the quiet river valley, the water surface covered with water lilies at the edges lies before the sailor in quiet splendour, bitterns and herons dwell in secluded bays," YACHT describes this 1922. "The observer is reluctant to tear himself away from the landscape after passing two fixed bridges, but the masts have to be set and made ready for the race."
At the end of the regatta, the dinghies meet at the jetty in Utecht, "and after a short stay, we return to Lübeck in the evening in a double queue behind the motorboat (with music!). There we moor at the LYC boathouse and after the prize-giving ceremony there is an opportunity to enjoy the charming view of old Lübeck as darkness falls and to spin a yarn."
Sailors live by the lake in summer
This "special experience" for out-of-town guests has been a weekend routine for the members of the SCH for many years. At the turn of the century, a weekly train starts sailing or towing up the Wakenitz on Saturdays from 2 pm and back to Lübeck on Sundays from 5 pm. They spend the night in tents or the open boats. Later, they lease land on Lake Ratzeburg and build simple weekend houses without electricity or running water themselves. Many sailors live in their holiday homes throughout the summer and don't shy away from the effort of cycling to and from work every day; it's better to be close to the boat than in the city.
Today, the sparse houses built by the association are modernised and sought-after weekend homes for families from Lübeck or Hamburg who belong to the SCH.
Just like the club premises, the SCH's early fleet is the result of our own hard work. The first converted lifeboats marked the beginning of a small boatbuilding story that only ended with the introduction of GRP as a material and the series production of small yachts such as Varianta and Neptun. The club members initially built open racing dinghies, later dinghy cruisers; simple but fast boats that are a far cry from the noble cracks from the pen of Max Oertz, but which modestly fulfil their purpose.
The Hansa Sailing Club builds its own boats
At the beginning of the 1950s, YACHT still praised: "The Hansa Sailing Club of 1898 in Lübeck once again had an opportunity to bear witness to the creative enthusiasm of its members. After a year of work, three members had built new boats themselves, two 15-boat racing dinghies and a 20-boat dinghy cruiser. These 15-boat racing dinghies are the first in a series of three more new boats to be built next year. The 20 dinghy cruiser is the fourth new build in its class. In the presence of all members of the SCH, the activities of the three new owners were honoured by the chairman and the vessels were handed over to the element under a triple Gode wind in the hope of bringing much joy to the owner and numerous successes to the SCH under the blue and white banner."
The sailors at SC Hansa not only built the club building themselves, they also built numerous boats themselves
Sometimes quite adventurous manoeuvres are necessary to complete the club boats. In the early 1950s, model maker Alfred Bahr, now 90 years old, constructed the keel, stem and stern of his Pirate in his workshop near the Wakenitz. He then transported all the parts across Lübeck on his bicycle to assemble them in his shed.
Affinity for small, classic wooden boats
The planks of the Wilhelminian-style boats have long since disintegrated. Steffen Thiemann, SCH chronicler, reports: "The original lifeboats no longer exist, nor do the 15-person racing dinghies that we built ourselves. There are perhaps 15 racing dinghies of this type left in the whole of Germany, and some of them will come to the anniversary."
The club still has an affinity for small, classic wooden boats. Steffen Thiemann sails an H dinghy, and in 2007 he invited sailing friends to a small celebration to mark the boat's 70th birthday. They came to the lake with racing dinghies, dinghy cruisers and ewer boats; a race was held: It was the birth of the Schanzenberg Classics, which has been organised every two years since then under the sponsorship of the Friends of Classic Yachts.
In the same year it was founded, the Lübeck Yacht Club became a member of the German Sailing Association (DSVb), which had been founded just a year earlier. The purpose of the DSVb was, among other things, the implementation of similar sailing and surveying regulations, class divisions and time allowances, as well as compliance with standardised yachting practices. The 28 clubs organised in the DSVb at the time enjoy privileges such as exemption from harbour or pilotage fees in many ports in the kingdom or from obtaining a certificate of competence for sailing smaller yachts.
Until 1933, the workers' associations kept to themselves
Although the DSVb's statutes do not explicitly exclude the membership of workers' clubs, they do not find access to the association and its regatta events - or do not want it. Club life at the SCH is characterised by community and grassroots democracy: the members review board decisions at monthly meetings and sometimes overturn them. A tradition that continues to this day.
The SCH joined the Free Sailing Association, which initially represented the interests of sailing clubs based on the labour movement in Berlin and from the mid-1920s onwards throughout Germany, not only because of its status, but also because it tended to take a more left-wing political stance. Until the Gleichschaltung in 1933, the workers' clubs raced among their own kind.
When swastika flags were to be flown throughout the country on 1 May 1933 to celebrate Labour Day, the members of the SCH unceremoniously dismantled the flagpoles at their clubhouse. This act of defiance under the then chairman and communist Karl Ross resulted in the club being expropriated and banned. Its members refused to vacate the clubhouse and were eventually allowed to lease their own building after being forced to join the Lübeck Sailing Club. Its chairman Karl Ross is later arrested due to his political views and dies a few months before the end of the war as a result of his imprisonment in Neuengamme concentration camp.
After the war, the district lies on the zone border
After the Second World War, both clubs have some trouble wresting their clubhouses and boats from the British occupying forces and starting afresh. For decades, their territory on the Wakenitz was a zonal border which, luckily for sailors, ran along the high tide line, allowing them to beach their boats unmolested.
With the economic miracle and the social upheavals of the 1960s, the social arrogance on both sides also levelled out. Today, the Travemünde Week is far removed from the elitist habitus of its founding years. The second largest regatta in the world after Kieler Woche gives sailing a place as a popular sport and gives ambitious sailors the opportunity to compete in their classes. In addition, there is still sailing for a bottle of Lübeck Rotspon today, when the mayors of Lübeck and Kiel compete against each other.
Jeans or blazer? Etiquette is held high at the LYC
However, both clubs still value their own traditions and customs. In 1977, young sailors in jeans and floppy hats claimed their place in the sailing world with old boats, explains the chairman of the LYC, Reinhard Meumann: "I don't think yachting customs are old hat, although times have changed in some respects. We certainly don't want uniformity, but I do think that some customs and traditions of the 'good old days' should be preserved. The appearance of the yacht crew ashore also seems important to me: I don't necessarily want to demand that they go ashore in blazers, as is probably advisable on official occasions, but a German sailor should present a neat and tidy appearance in the host country. The same must also apply to his boat. At the Lübeck Yacht Club, we make a point of emphasising yachting customs when training our young people, and I believe that our cruising and regatta sailors also adhere to them as far as possible."
There is no longer any sign of the elitist attitude of earlier years at the yacht club. Popular sport has long since taken centre stage
Of course, flag-dipping has long since been dispensed with, the dress code has become more casual and social background more irrelevant. "But essentially," explains Frank Schärffe, the current Managing Director of the LYC and Travemünde Week, "we still value good behaviour and a good appearance." Accordingly, anyone wishing to become a member of the LYC needs two people from the club's ranks to vouch for them, or they can introduce themselves personally to the board.
"Our members now come from all walks of life, with small boats on the lake and occasionally with large yachts on the Baltic Sea," explains SCH chronicler Steffen Thiemann. "But what has remained is the community that we live. And, of course, the greeting of the working sailors: Godewind ahoy!"
The events in the anniversary year
Lübeck Yacht Club
Back in January, an invitation was extended to a Travemünde Week reception at boot in Düsseldorf. Among other things, an image film about club life was presented at this event. The Travemünde Week was given a new design to mark the anniversary. There will also be a reception for invited guests in the clubhouse on the Wakenitz on the historic founding date of 30 August. Finally, on 11 November, a ball for members, relatives and guests of honour will bring the anniversary year to a festive close. Meanwhile, the club yacht "Meu" has been travelling the Atlantic as a sailing ambassador with skipper Clara Weimer since the beginning of August. The ship will sail to the Caribbean and back for a year and a half.
Hansa Sailing Club
From 18 to 21 August, there will be celebrations in Lübeck on the Wakenitz and on the Schanzenberg on Lake Ratzeburg. To mark the anniversary, the Schanzenberg Classics will take place this time on the Wakenitz in front of the clubhouse in Lübeck. As in the old days, the wooden boats will be towed from the lake to Lübeck on Friday evening and welcomed with a regatta celebration. After a reception with numerous guests of honour, the races are held on Saturday and Sunday and continue on Lake Ratzeburg on Monday. During the anniversary weekend, the SCH is putting on an exhibition of artefacts from its 125-year history in the mess room of its boathouse. These include handwritten regatta books, historic sailing prizes, regatta china and models. The exhibition is open to all interested parties.
