Life at Sea: The Nautical Adventures of Classic Hollywood By Raquel Stecher
To escape the trappings of fame, Humphrey Bogart, Errol Flynn and Sterling Hayden took to the open seas in search of peace and quiet. Sailing offered an opportunity to invest their energy in something other than movie making and to find some much-needed solace. Let’s take a look at these three movie stars and their passion for all things nautical.
“Unless you really understand the water and understand the reason for being on it and understand the love of sailing and the feeling of quietness and solitude, you don't really belong on a boat anyway.” – Humphrey Bogart
The greatest love of Bogart’s life, besides Lauren Bacall and their two children, was his yacht the Santana. In Bacall’s memoir she wrote, “if ever I had a woman to be jealous of, she was the Santana.” Bogart’s love of sailing began in childhood with family trips to Lake Canandaigua in New York. When Bogart became a movie star, he indulged his interest in sailing and purchased a motor yacht he named Sluggy. It also happened to be the nickname he gave to his then wife, Mayo Methot. He found comfort being at sea. It was an escape from his turbulent marriage and his busy shooting schedule. Whenever he needed some peace and quiet, he would take his yacht out onto the waters to disconnect from everything.
He sold Sluggy and eventually bought Santana, the 54-foot yacht that he named after the yacht featured in his film KEY LARGO (’48). According to Bacall, Bogart was infatuated with the Santana. He learned everything about her history, participated in races with her, had a miniature model of her and even named his production company, which produced such films as IN A LONELY PLACE (’50) and BEAT THE DEVIL (’53), Santana Productions. He was a member of the Newport Harbor Yacht Club and Los Angeles Yacht Club and would often take Bacall on his seafaring adventures. Bogart’s dying wish was for his ashes to be scattered over the Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately, the practice was illegal at the time and he was laid to rest in Forest Lawn Memorial. In lieu of a casket, the model of the Santana stood at his wake.
“The only real wives I have ever had have been my sailing ships.” – Errol Flynn
Australian-born Errol Flynn, the swashbuckling star of seafaring adventures such as CAPTAIN BLOOD (’35), THE SEA HAWK (’40) and AGAINST ALL FLAGS (’52), was an avid sailor in his own right. He was a direct descendant, on his mother’s side, of Midshipman Ned Young, a mutineer on the HMS Bounty in the late 1700s. This connection would come in handy with his first movie role IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY (’33), which was about that historic mutiny. Warner Bros. publicized their new star as a descendant of Fletcher Christian, whom he plays in the film, instead of Young, to drum up interest in the film. Before acting, Flynn held many jobs, including charter-boat captain, river boat guide, fisherman and shipping clerk. Flynn grew up near the Hobart and Sydney Harbors and developed a great love for sailing.
In 1937, he wrote and published his first memoir, Beam Ends, a reference to the nautical term “on the beam ends”, in which he discussed his seven-month journey from Sydney Harbor to New Guinea and back on his boat the Sirocco. He named his next boat Sirocco as well, instead of Sirocco II, which went against nautical superstitions.
When Flynn and actress Lili Damita divorced in 1942, she won their home in an alimony suit and Flynn lived on his yacht. He spent the last years of his life living in Jamaica with his third wife Patrice Wymore and his trusty schooner Zaca. He went on many adventures with the Zaca traveling to Mexico and throughout the Caribbean. At the end of his life, the financially strapped Flynn was forced to sell the Zaca but died of a heart attack before he could do so.
“I caught a glimpse of the harbor. The glow inside me turned to a dancing flame. At the end of a sun-swept wharf lay a ship with two high masts. She was gone in a flash but I knew I’d be back, and I shivered.” – Sterling Hayden
When his mother and stepfather moved the family to Tumbler Island in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, Hayden became sea-struck. According to Hayden biographer Lee Mandel, he was “enchanted by the ocean” and immediately set out to seek a life at sea. He had no interest in becoming a fisherman. Hayden instead dreamed of traveling on the high seas and visiting exotic locales along the way. He wasted no time in making his dream a reality. At age 16, he got a job on a schooner headed for California called the Puritan. Hayden seemed destined to be a sailor. He was eager to learn and athletic enough to endure the backbreaking work that went into long voyages at sea. Unfortunately, life as a sailor didn’t pay well and it was a pair of seafaring buddies who convinced him to find a new job that would help pay for his interest in sailing. He auditioned for a movie role and the rest was history.
Hayden didn’t want to become a movie star. He saw it as a means to an end: a way to earn enough money to get back to the sea. In 1955, he purchased the schooner the Wanderer for $200,000. A few years later, he planned to take his four children on a long voyage aboard the Wanderer. He was in a bitter custody battle with his wife Betty. Hayden got custody of his kids but was told by the judge he couldn’t take them on his planned voyage because of the condition of the ship. Hayden ignored the judge and took them anyways. Now a fugitive of the law, Hayden, his children and his crew went on a 10-month journey across the Pacific to Tahiti and back. Hayden eventually had to sell off the Wanderer to pay off debts, something that pained him greatly. In 1998, he wrote a memoir called The Wanderer, about his life and love of sailing.
