Leo Bentz, Ski Nautique and Boat #1

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   Leo Bentz, Ski Nautique and Boat #1

I've been trying to figure out how to tell this story since we returned from our 55 year journey back in time to recover an artifact so relevant to our sport and hobby it's unfathomable.   Three days later I've decided to just post what I've come to know as fact, through magazine articles, documents and conversations with the parties involved.  To give proper credit to the authors/originators, everything I reproduce here is done so with the permissions of Leo Bentz, Mark and Bob Cleary, and Zenon Bilas.  Of major importance is to give proper credit to Art Cozier, without Art's detective work and persistence over the last few months this story, or better yet, the continuation of it, would not have been possible.

Excerpt from a Zenon Bilas article 1991.

“During the '40's and early 50's, “serious” skiers typically favored wooden inboard boats, like the Beautiful old Chris Crafts, the Century Resorters, and the Correct Craft's Atom Skiers.  Although these inboards had large wakes and would be considered sluggish by today's standards, they were the towboat of choice for the freshly organized band of competitive skiers.  As the 50's wore on and tournament water skiing became more and more popular. Crosby twin rig outboards, the first fiberglass boats, became the favorite among competitors.  Crosbys, which evolved into today's hydrodynes, had smaller wakes and a lot of power, great for slalom and jumping.  Their draw-back however, was high fuel consumption, and rigging the boat with twin motors was complicated.

All of this frustrated Leo Bentz, who ran a thriving Florida ski school in the '50s and early '60s.  Dissatisfied with the wooden inboards with their huge wakes, and complicated twin outboard rigs, Bentz decided to design and build the perfect boat, one made specifically for water skiing and for Miami Beach's Lee's Ski School.”

Skipping ahead in the article a little bit

“Building a plug and mold can run between $50,000 and $100,000- if the process is started from scratch.

Leo Bentz admits to taking one of his old Higgins boats he used at this school to make his first plug.  After incorporating secret techniques to the hull design to produce a smaller wake, he contracted the subsequent steps to outside firms.  Bob Conn, a Miami boat builder specializing in performance craft, built the fiberglass mold, and Bentz contracted with another Miami builder to manufacture his new ski boat in lots of 12.  All of a sudden, Bentz was in the boat building business.”

A major omission in the article is that prior to the 12 production boats, there was one prototype produced by Bob Conn.  The first production boat was sold to William Grimditch, whose son Wayne was to become world jump champion 9 years later.  The prototype was sold to Bob Cleary who attended Bentz' ski school,  his intent was to sell Ski Nautiques to boat dealers in Northeast.

“In September of 1959, Bentz and his wife attended the World Championships in Milan, Italy, and visited the French Riviera.  There they discovered a ski school going full blast in Cannes, operating as “L'escole de Ski Nautique” (translated “the school of water skiing”)  Bentz adopted the name Ski Nautique for his boat.”

“Bentz sold his Ski Nautique under the company name of Glass Craft. Shortly after producing the first batch of Ski Nautiques, Bentz decided that he had his hands full with his ski school, teaching as many as 100 people per day! He wanted out of the boat-building responsibilities and in the spring of 1961, he approached Correct Craft, intending to sell them his mold for $10,000.  Amazingly, in retrospect, Correct Craft was not interested in buying the nautique mold, perhaps for two reasons.  First, Correct Craft was just seeing daylight from a bankruptcy proceeding caused when a government contract evaporated; and it had just introduced it's own fiberglass inboard ski boat, which the company was marketing as the American Skier.

But, Several months later, Bentz received a personal vist from the Walt Meloons- senior and junior- at his Miami Beach ski school.  Bentz says he felt that the purpose of the Meloon's change of heart was because well-known tourmanent skiers had testafied that the Ski Nautique design was the best one available to the water skiers of the day.

So, the Meloons made Bents an offer he couldn't refuse and the mold and the name changed hands to Correct Craft.  (The agreement was that Bentz would receive one boat annually for three years, and Correct Craft was to be responsible for servicing the Ski Nautiques that had been sold previously)”

A photo of Leo and his family in the prototype Ski Nautique

Photos of Lee's Ski School, Miami Beach

Leo Bentz, Ski Nautique and Boat #1

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