Since 1938, boaters have descended upon Milwaukee inJune to race to the shores of Michigan: The end point alternates each year between Muskegon and Grand Haven. At stake is a 15-inch cup of ornate silver, the Queen’s Cup. But the cup’s history goes back much further.
The Queen’s Cup was originally struck in London by silversmith R&S Garrard & Co. in 1847, a year before the more heralded America’s Cup. The older cup was first awarded to Silvie of the New York Yacht Club for taking second place in an 1853 English regatta. It next found its way to the International Yacht Club in Detroit in the 1870s, when it was given to Commodore Kirkland Barker. After Barker’s drowning death, the cup vanished until a young Walter Hull found it while cleaning a storeroom in Detroit in the early 1900s. Hull moved to Milwaukee, and in 1938, he gave the heirloom to the South Shore Yacht Club, which created the race to Michigan.
The club was long convinced its cup was older than the America’s Cup. In 2006, club officer Bruce Nason confirmed this with R&S Garrard. After examining markings on the cups, the still-functioning company sent an e-mail declaring, “Your cup is the older.”
As for the race itself, it covers roughly 67 nautical miles and can last upward of 12 hours. “You’ve got to be ready for anything,” says Tom Thomas, 63, who’s raced about 25 times. “One year, four of my crew of seven were throwing up over the side.”
It’s a festive event, with contestants typically dressed more for a Jimmy Buffet show than an all-night regatta. “People think yachting is elitist, and everybody is out here with a blue blazer on,” says Nason. “Ninety percent don’t even own one.”But they do enjoy the history. “There’s the spirit of doing the same things the club elders have done and keeping a tradition alive,” says Ken Dziubek, 63, who’s raced since 1980. “It’s just filled with good memories.”
