This year, the members of the Hamburg Sailing Club Oevelgönne, founded in 1901 (SCOe), are celebrating 125 years of club history. The German Sailing Association (DSV) is marking the anniversary with a profile on its website. You can also read it below here on YACHT online, courtesy of the DSV:
Let’s keep sailing together
On no fewer than two occasions, the members of the SCOe have had to rebuild their club virtually from scratch. But because a hands-on, do-it-yourself approach has always been part of the SCOe’s DNA, the Elbe-based club from Köhlfleet remains a vibrant community for young and old, recreational and competitive sailors alike, even in its 125th anniversary year.
How it all began…
On New Year’s Day 1901, Bernhard Schulz, Hermann Pohlmann, Albert Heinze, Georg Löffler, Arthur Weiss, Willi Ludwig and Martin Derner gathered for a morning pint at the “Robert Fischer” pub in Oevelgönne, which at that time was still part of Prussian Altona. The seven sailing enthusiasts solemnly resolved to found a club “with the sole aim of pledging mutual friendship, always sticking together and helping one another at every opportunity” – the Segel-Club Oevelgönne von 1901 e.V. was born.
In order to preserve the close-knit atmosphere and camaraderie they valued, the friends decided not to accept any further members. However, this resolution did not last long: the dinghies ‘Elbe’, ‘Kille’ and ‘Seemöve’, which were soon acquired, attracted interested young people, and in 1912 the ban on new members was officially lifted.
… and what happened next
As early as 1913, the fledgling club, based on the banks of the Elbe – which were still very tranquil at the time – had 65 members and 24 boats. In 1914, the club organised a full sailing programme: club regattas on the Elbe, as well as participation in the national regatta. Five SCOe boats took part, and all won prizes.
Then came the upheaval of the First World War. Seventeen SCOe members died at the front, and all the club’s boats had to be sold due to financial difficulties. The club had to reinvent itself – and did so through hard work, solidarity and voluntary effort. By 1922, it had 61 members and 15 boats again, and internal regattas were introduced.
During those years, members regularly sailed the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, sometimes in the most adverse conditions. A prime example is the voyage undertaken by Arthur Ott, who sailed to Heligoland in 1925 in his 5.5-metre dinghy, the ‘Irmgard’.
The next major step came in 1926: the move to the other side of the Elbe, to our own site on the Köhlfleet in Finkenwerder. The slipway, rails, pontoons, tidal bridge, buoy system, a 50-metre jetty and boathouse were built almost entirely by the members themselves. Two-thirds of the members were tradesmen, most of whom were unemployed due to the economic crisis and keen to get stuck in. The first clubhouse was a small wooden hut, affectionately known as the ‘Wanzenbude’.
With Adolf Hitler’s appointment as Reich Chancellor in 1933, many freedoms came to an end at the SCOe as well. Sports clubs were ‘brought into line’, and the club’s chairman had to be a member of the NSDAP. No SCO member was in the Nazi Party in 1933, so a water sports representative of the NSDAP appointed himself ‘club leader’. A year later, the SCOe was forcibly merged with another sailing club and given new statutes. Among other things, these stipulated that members under the age of 35 had to complete an hour of athletics exercises on the club grounds on Sunday mornings. Sailing continued on the Köhlfleet and the Lower Elbe. In 1936, the ‘Rund um Pagensand’ regatta took place for the first time; it will celebrate its 90th anniversary in 2026.
In 1939, club activities came to a virtual standstill, and in 1944 the club grounds were severely damaged by bombs. The few who had stayed behind, mostly older members, did their best to salvage whatever remained after the bombing. Once again, everyone pitched in, and through countless work sessions, the devastated site was cleared and the destroyed wooden jetty replaced with a steel structure.
Funds were scarce and materials were in short supply, but the determination to design, build and sail remained undiminished. Thus, in the post-war years, a legendary fleet of steel Blitz dinghy cruisers came into being. Club member Georg Sievert, known as Schöttel, made his workshop available; frames were bent, sheets of metal pressed, and parts riveted. With limited resources but great ingenuity, a legendary fleet was created. “In the end, the eight boats were raffled off among those who had built them,” says Sven-Ove Baumgartner, the SCOe’s first chairman.
In 1948, the club race ‘Around Pagensand’ was relaunched; it later became a fixture as the Pagensand Regatta – a sporting highlight, but also a social gathering.
The 1960s: Hamburg’s port was booming and needed more space. As a result, the Hamburg marina on the Köhlfleet had to make way for an oil refinery. Many clubs moved to the new marina in neighbouring Wedel. The SCOe’s summer fleet also moved to Wedel in 1967, to Schlengel K. However, the site on the Köhlfleet remained the social hub of the club. New halls were added, whilst youth development was strengthened: a junior group in the Optimist class, children’s parties on the site – sailing became a family and community sport. Several generations of young SCO members spent their free time on the wild, sprawling grounds, building dens and tree houses, until the Hamburg Port Authority claimed large parts of the site in the 1990s.
In the 1980s and 1990s, the SCOe enjoyed a golden age of sailing: its blue, white and red flag was a familiar sight at Kieler Woche, Travemünder Woche, the Sandhamn Regatta and international championships – with OK dinghies, FDs, Sharpies, dinghy cruisers and keelboats.
Many members still have vivid memories of the cutter-building project in the early 2000s. The youth sailing cutter “Möwe” was built largely by the members themselves and financed by a generous donation from a club member. “All the masts and spars and all the stainless steel parts were made by our club members themselves,” recalls First Chairman Baumgartner, “and before the launch on the Köhlfleet, virtually the whole club was at the Jensen shipyard round the clock to finish the cutter.” Today, even after the end of the cutter boom on the Elbe, the “Möwe” remains a key part of our youth work. Not only is it actively sailed, but on board the young people also learn how to repair, varnish and maintain the woodwork.
The club today
Just in time for the anniversary, the clubhouse has been given a fresh new look, with new flooring, light-coloured walls instead of dark panelling, and modernised toilet facilities. Once again, the members have shouldered the lion’s share of the work.
To this day, voluntary work is not merely a means to an end, but the glue that binds the community together. At the club grounds on Antwerpenstraße, members spend the winter working on their boats, maintaining the grounds, drinking coffee or simply looking out together over the flood defences at the bustling Köhlfleet. To organise winter storage, launching and hauling out, the members meet once a month during the winter months.
Prudent financial management remains our guiding principle. Here’s an example: every winter storage space has its own electricity meter, and charges are billed per member. To ensure everything is fair, there is a ‘meter warden’. In addition, the SCOe has a tractor warden, a winch warden and several hall wardens, to name just a few of the voluntary roles.
Today, the SCOe has around 250 sailors, including children and young people. The club deliberately keeps its membership numbers manageable. “The club works because everyone gets involved,” sums up the first chairman, Sven-Ove Baumgartner, better known as “Petrus”. He has been at the helm of the club since 2002 and, “thanks to a good board”, still enjoys the role immensely.
The committee strives to appeal to both older and younger members alike – the older members through the “Blinkfüer”, published seven times a year, and coffee mornings for senior members, and the younger members through Optimist and 420 training on the Elbe. The focus here is on a holistic sailing education. “We don’t train elite-level sailors; others are better at that,” says Sven-Ove Baumgartner.
That said, competitive racing is also in the club’s DNA. SCOe members regularly compete in international championships in dinghies and keelboats, and with Thomas Reinecke’s ‘Edelweiss’, an SCOe boat even took part in the revival of the Admiral’s Cup.
A glimpse into the future
The SCOe’s anniversary year begins on 1 January 2026 at 11 am with an anniversary reception on Antwerpenstraße. A big celebration for all members and friends of the club is planned for the summer. In the autumn, the Pagensand Regatta will celebrate its 90th anniversary – with a big party in Wedel.
The SCOe, together with other clubs on the Elbe, has made it its mission to revive competitive sailing on the river. And the first successes are already evident: the “Elbe Super Sailing Tour”, a newly created regatta series, is fostering connections and providing an incentive to compete against others. Even if the sailing area is “not always pure fun” (Baumgartner), the aim is to build on the glory days of the 1980s and 1990s on the Elbe.
“Uncompromisingly affordable thanks to our own efforts” will remain the SCOe’s guiding principle in the future. The halls on Antwerpenstraße will continue to be the heart of the club. To ensure this, we must maintain our spirit of hands-on commitment and self-reliance.
The owner of the club grounds on Köhlfleet is the Hamburg Port Authority; the SCOe uses the site free of charge under a framework sports agreement. Should the port be expanded again and the land be required, the club must vacate the site within six months. However, this scenario currently seems highly unlikely – “especially as the city would have to provide us with a comparable alternative site,” says Sven-Ove Baumgartner.
This is the Oevelgönne Sailing Club
The Segel-Club Oevelgönne von 1901 e.V. has 250 members, a winter storage facility on Hamburg’s Köhlfleet and summer moorings in Hamburg’s marina in Wedel. Club members mainly go on sailing trips, but also take part in regattas in various classes. New members are very welcome. Contact: Segel-Club Oevelgönne von 1901 e.V., email: vorstand@scoe.de, www.scoe.de
