Collection: Speed Boats

The first runabouts date back to the 1920s and were originally small, fast, powerful, varnished, wooden boats created to take of the outboard motor. Among the leading builders of 1920s runabouts was John L. Hacker, who founded the Hacker Boat Company in 1908. Hacker was a pioneering naval architect who developed many design innovations, like the 'V-bottom'. His designs became the model upon which virtually all subsequent runabouts were based. Shortly, similar upscale varnished-wood runabouts by Gar Wood and Chris-Craft and were also available. But by the late 1940s, Gar Wood had stopped producing boats, and by the 1960s Chris-Craft was moving to the more modern materials of plastic and fiberglass. The mahogany runabouts built by Italian builder Carlo Riva in the late 1950s and the 1960s are considered by many to be premier European examples of the type. The most famous Riva of all time was the Carlo Riva design called the Aquarama Special.