The story of the New Haven sharpie presents an interesting case in the
history of the development of small commercial boats in America. As has
been shown, the New Haven sharpie took only about 40 years to reach a
very efficient stage of development as a fishing sailboat. It was
economical to build, well suited to its work, a fast sailer, and
attractive in appearance.
When sailing vessels ceased to be used by the fishing industry, the
sharpie was almost forgotten, but some slight evidence of its influence
on construction remains. For instance, transverse tie rods are used in
the large Chesapeake Bay "skipjacks," and Chesapeake motorboats still
have round, vertically staved sterns, as do the "Hatteras boats" used on
the Carolina Sounds. But the sharpie hull form has now almost completely
disappeared in both areas, except in a few surviving flat-bottomed
sailing skiffs.
Recently the flat-bottomed hull has come into use in small,
outboard-powered commercial fishing skiffs, but, unfortunately, these
boats usually are modeled after the primitive flatiron skiff and are
short in length.
The New Haven sharpie proved that a long, narrow hull is most efficient
in a flat-bottomed boat, but no utilization has yet been made of its
design as the basis for the design of a modern fishing launch.