Charles Currey

Charles Currey was born into a family with strong links to the sea and was expected to follow a career in the British Navy. Illness ruled out a naval career and instead he pursued a career in the boat building industry and also built up a reputation as one if the best young dinghy sailors in the country. With the advent of World War Two he joined the Naval Reserve and would go on to command a naval gunboat patrolling the English Channel. He eventually reached the rank of Lieutenant Commander.

At the end of the war he went to work for Fairey Marine and one of the projects he was involved in was that of bringing the Firefly dinghy into full production. The Firefly was to become an Olympic boat in 1948 and Currey, with expert knowledge of both boat and local water conditions, was considered a strong contender for the Olympic title but he was not picked for the British team as a more experienced sailor was favoured by the national selection committee.

Both Currey and the company he worked for were pioneers of the new Finn dinghy in the early fifties and he was selected to compete at the Helsinki Olympics where he placed second behind the legendary Paul Elvstrøm but ahead of the boat’s designer Rickard Sarby. Currey’s career brought him success in a wide variety of dinghies over a period of forty years and also encompassed some powerboat racing.

An accomplished dinghy builder and designer he became managing director of the Fairey Marine Company in the sixties and was one of those responsible for overhauling the rules of Finn class racing during that decade. His son Alistair Currey was also an accomplished yachtsman and represented his country at the 1972 Olympic Games.