Feature Article

Class Volunteers and Finger Lakes Boating Museum work together to keep Ray Walvoord’s Lightning # 898, Johanna on the water

As described in the Pultneyville Yacht Club history, Past Commodore Ray Walvoord built Lightning #898 in 1941 in his back yard in Pultneyville. However, he went into the Coast Guard immediately after graduating from RIT in 1942 and did not get to sail it until he returned from WWII. The boat was named Johanna after his wife and is the namesake for the Johanna Cup race that is still sailed today.

When Ray was no longer able to sail, he donated his Lightning to the Finger Lakes Boating Museum in Hammondsport. In 2018 at the age of 96, Ray attended the Keuka Yacht Club Lightning Champagne Regatta on Keuka Lake to see his boat being sailed. In 2021, Pultneyville Yacht Club member and Lightning sailor Eric Anderson took his crew to Keuka Lake where he sailed Johanna in the Champagne Regatta. 

Ray passed away on May 25, 2022, at the age of 100, but his Lightning is getting a renewed life at the Boating Museum which is now partnering with the Lightning Class Association. This spring, the museum hosted the 4th annual Lighting workshop with Tom Allen Jr. from Allen Boatworks in Buffalo, the last remaining commercial Lightning builder in the US.  

#898 was one of the two museum boats included in the workshop, and among the significant upgrades were the installation of new chain plates to accommodate a lifting bridle, fabricating a new tiller and rudder and reinforcing the centerboard trunk. In the weeks since the workshop, the work was continued by Ed Wightman and the museum’s crew of volunteers and includes hull and deck refinishing and now looks as good as it did when Ray finished it in 1941. What made this restoration so special was the collaborative effort by the Lightning Class and Museum volunteers - in all over 20 different volunteers helped to get this boat back on the water!

#898 competed for the Finger Lakes Boating Museum in the 2026 Champagne Regatta on Keuka Lake on July 27th and 28th, 2026. Unfortunately, the air was light and only three races could be completed on Saturday and none on Sunday. There were 32 boats entered, 16 each in the Modern Division and the Classic Division where #898 came in 14th, not bad considering the need to tune the mast to the new chain plates and competing against experienced crews!

Pultneyville Yacht Club History - Interview with Ray Walvoord, Watch on YouTube