Staff Writer

Evolution in ship design sometimes takes a magnificent leap forward only to be followed in short order by extinction. That's what happened to the most spectacular of all sailing ships: the clipper.

For a brief period, from about 1846 to 1859, economics lined up just right with development in ship design to produce ships that were built for speed at the expense of all other considerations.

Sacrificing cargo capacity, safety and durability, shipyards built ships with knife-edge bows and towering masts. The owners gave them names that spoke of their speed and power: Flying Cloud, Flying Dragon, Stag Hound, Lightning, Wizard King, Sea Witch.

Maine was a relatively small player, producing approximately 60 clipper ships, about 15 percent of the total American fleet.

But Maine yards produced some of the fastest and most famous ships.

The Red Jacket, built in Rockland, traveled between New York and Liverpool, England, in 13 days, one hour and 25 minutes, a record for sailing vessels that lasted until 1980, when it was broken by a lightweight hydrofoil trimaran.

The Snow Squall, whose hull was painted gleaming white when launched on its maiden voyage from South Portland, set a round-trip record of 53 days between New York City and Rio de Janeiro.

The Flying Scud, built in Damarsicotta, claimed the fastest day's run ever, traveling 449 miles in a 24-hour period.

The Typhoon, built in Kittery in 1851, traveled from Calcutta to the Cape of Good Hope in 37 days, a record equaled by only one sailing ship, the Witch of the Wave, which was built the same year on the other side of the Piscataqua River in Portsmouth, N.H.

The advent of the graceful clipper ships allowed the fitting of a full-length figurehead at the bow, often in the form of a woman.

One of the most beautiful of the extreme clippers, the Nightingale, built in South Eliot in 1851, had at its bow an exquisitely sculptured figurehead of Jenny Lind, the opera star known as the "Swedish Nightingale."

SPEED CREATES PROFITS

Until the 1840s, cargo moved over the seas in slow, high-capacity vessels. Efficiency, not speed, was the key to profits.

The opening of tea trade with China changed the economics. Merchants found that the ship that arrived with the first tea of the year made the highest profits. Suddenly, global shipping turned into a race.

The California gold strike in 1849 continued to fuel the quest for speed as clippers raced around Cape Horn to deliver supplies and people to San Francisco.

The Flying Dragon, launched in Bath in 1852, was the fastest of the Maine-built California clippers. It was the only Maine clipper to make the passage between New York and San Francisco in less than 100 days.

When it came to designing clipper ships, economy and long life were literally thrown to the wind. Narrow bows allowed the ships to drive though the seas at much greater speeds. The greater breadth of the ships in proportion to their length increased buoyancy and the ability to carry an exceptionally large spread of sail.

Crews of 25 to as many as 100 men worked to position the sails to optimum effect.

The ships were even faster than the early steamships that were in use at the time.

For a while, these expensive sailing ships paid for themselves on a single voyage, said John Lienhard, host of a nationally syndicated radio show called "The Engines of Our Ingenuity," which explores the connection between technology and culture.

Clipper ships were part of a state of mind, he said. At the time, increasingly faster locomotives also were being developed, he said, and the public became enthralled with the idea of "pure, beautiful, soul-satisfying speed."

THE END COMES FAST

But the economic forces that made clipper ships profitable dissipated as rapidly as they had arisen. The depression of the mid-1850s, which culminated in the Panic of 1857, reduced the demand for freight and dampened the...