My 1978 17' Chris Craft Lancer ~ Stinger



A History:

Chris-Craft Boats was an American manufacturer of boats that was founded by Christopher Columbus Smith.
Chris Smith built his first wooden boat in 1874 at the age of 13. Years later, he built a duck hunting boat that his friends liked and they asked him to build them one.
This was technically the start of the boat company, but he soon began to build more boats and joined his brother Hank in 1881 to begin producing boats full-time, and "Chris Craft" was born.
In 1910, the brothers joined with other partners to form the Smith Ryan Boat Company and the firm's name was changed in 1922 to Chris Smith & Sons Boat Company.


In 1924 another name change was made, officially, to Chris-Craft.


The Detroit-area company became well known for its sleek racing boats in the 1910s and 1920s.

Chris-Craft manufactured its first fiberglass boat by 1955, then added a metal boat division in 1957, designated as "the Roamer" Steel Boats Division (RSBD). This was founded upon its purchase of the Roamer Boat Company, and the boats became known as Chris Craft Roamers.


The company continued to be independent until it was acquired by Shields & Company's NAFI Corporation in 1960 and merged with NAFI. The merged company was renamed in 1962 as Chris-Craft ndustries. The merged company acquired the Old Crown Brewing Corporation, a brewery  in Fort Wayne, Indiana, but Old Crown was sold to its employees a short time later.
In 1964, Chris-Craft launched the all-fiberglass Chris-Craft Commander. This dramatic new design was unveiled at the New York City National Boat show, perched at the top of an escalator on a giant, castered cradle. This first Commander was a 38' express hardtop with a 13' beam. The line of Commanders soon grew to include sizes ranging from 19' to 60' all styled in fiberglass.

In 1968, Baldwin-Montrose Chemical Co., Inc. took a controlling interest in Chris-Craft and installed its chairman, Herbert J. Siegel, as Chris-Craft's chairman.
In 1977, Chris-Craft Industries formed BHC, Inc. to hold two television stations, KCOP in Los Angeles and KPTV in Portland, Oregon, both placed within BHC's Chris-Craft Television, Inc. subsidiary.
That same year, Chris-Craft purchased a share of 20th Century Fox.
The company attempted in 1979 a hostile take over of 20th Century Fox but failed and in 1981, the 20th Century Fox share, then at 20 percent, was traded to Marvin Davis and Marc Rich for 19 percent of United Television.

Between the 1960s and 1980s, Chris-Craft lost market share as competitors with less expensive manufacturing techniques, such as thinner fiberglass hulls, came on the scene.
Chris-Craft ended production of its last mahogany-hulled boat, the Constellation, in 1971.

Chris-Craft Industries sold its boat division to Murray Industries in 1981;


Saving Chris-Craft...


The energy crisis of the early 1970's hit the recreational boating industry hard, and by the mid 1970's the Chris-Craft boat division was losing money.
The losses prompted the Chris-Craft Industries (Formerly Chris Craft Boat.s) chairman Herb Siegel to begin a search for someone to turn the boating division around.
In 1978, Richard “Dick” Genth of Wellcraft was chosen for the job.

Dick left Wellcraft in 1978 to rebuild Chris-Craft and shortly after taking the job, Dick contacted Ernest J Schmidt, then Vice President of Sales at Hammond Boat, and offered him the VP position at Chris-Craft.

As the former president of both Thunderbird Products/Formula and Wellcraft boat companies at one time, Dick Genth led both companies to profitability. At Chris-Craft, Dick made major changes to bring the company back to profitability. He overhauled product lines, consolidated model production, sold excess inventory, and shut down other, less profitable boat lines. Within 6 months of Dick's coming on-board, the Chris-Craft boating division produced a profit. Genth was so good at what he did, Powerboat magazine considered him "the Lee Iacocca of the marine industry".

The History of the Lancer and its Stinger model.

Chris Craft planned to continue to develop, refine, and expand the Lancer line until Genth came on board and he scrapped the whole line in favor of the Scorpions.
The newly styled 17’ Lancer base model came with the Mercruiser 140 and was a basic runabout with lounger seats up front, jump seats in the back, and a fiberglass engine box as all previous 17’s had since 1968. The Stinger however, had bucket seats and a bench in back with sunpad (a sign of things to come with the Scopions and XK models).
It also came standard with the 305 GLV V8 with Volvo Penta 280 Trans Drive. Research shows only 24 of these 17’ Lancer Stingers were made with one going to Puerto Rico and one to Hong Kong.
I’ve only seen two of these boats in the last five years anywhere on the Internet and I own one of them. Mine is number 9. It was recently purchased and will be undergoing a complete restoration
There is information that a Stinger version of the new 21’ Lancer was also offered in 1978. However, while the price sheets show a 21’ Lancer Stinger listed, the (very rare) brochure shows it as a Lancer 21’ cuddy.
Even that picture is only an artist rendering. I’m not sure if any were actually built. I have never seen one. I’ll be doing more research to confirm their existence.
Nowhere on the boat does it say “Stinger”, only in the factory literature.
Of all the Lancers built over a 12 year period, 1978 stands out as the most unique year producing the rarest of all Lancers.

Pictures of My 1978 Lancer Stinger as she sits now...


I would like to thank Craig Judge, whom I bought the boat from, the folks at the Chris-Craft Archive section of Mariner's Museum for providing a lot of valuable research information regarding this Lancer.