Viggo Jacobsen
31 Марта 2016
IN Memoriam - Viggo Jacobsen
Viggo Jacobsen, the founder of the International Optimist Dinghy Association, has died aged 102 in his home town of Aarhus.
The 'History records that:
"The International Optimist Dinghy Association (IODA) was founded at the fourth Regatta in 1965 in Turku in Finland. The first members were Austria, Denmark, Finland, Great Britain, Norway, Sweden and USA, followed shortly by Germany and Rhodesia (Zimbabwe).
The new association brought together the work of Viggo Jacobsen, who was elected president, and that of Nigel Ringrose as vice-president. These two were to remain in those positions for over 15 years with Viggo’s English-born wife Edith as honorary secretary.
Viggo was an ideal president. He had been trained in woodworking and had even owned a small boat-building company before the war. He had then joined the family paper-merchant business. As a Dragon sailor - like many of the most influential yachtsmen of his generation - he knew one-design sailing. Among other activities he organised the Århus Boat Show, the profits of which were used to fund junior sailing (after a loss in the first year). Bent Lyman’s comment that he was a ‘foreign minister’ acquired a wider meaning as he worked tirelessly with the various national groups as the Optimist spread."
When founded IODA had just seven member countries
on two continents: by the time Viggo retired in 1982 it
had 44 on all six continents and 30 nations at its Worlds!
In that period he had overseen such daring innovations as
the introduction of toe-straps, metal spars and, critical for
the Class, competitive fibreglass hulls.