Northpinellas: Man cuts his dreamboats down to manageable size

Man cuts his dreamboats down to manageable size

A hobbyist invests money, time and a whole lot of imagination on the model boats he builds at his Largo home.

By JULIANNE WU

LARGO -- Charlie Horton is a stickler for details.

Especially when it comes to scale-model boats like the 1938 triple cockpit barrel-back Chris-Craft he's working on at his Largo mobile home.

"Some people just buy a kit and put a boat together and that's that," said Horton, 80, who worked on switchboards for 30 years for the New York Telephone Co. before retiring to Florida. "I build these strictly for my own entertainment, and I like to add things."

And add he does: tiny, electric running lights for the bow and stern, real upholstery to the otherwise plain plastic seats and real mahogany just like the kind found on actual wooden Chris-Craft boats.

Horton said he has had a fascination for boats -- both life-size ones and the miniature versions -- since he was a boy growing up along Lake Ontario in Niagara Falls, N.Y.

"I actually owned several boats in my life, but I could never afford a Chris-Craft," he said. (They originally sold for about $3,400 to $5,000.)

These days, when the weather is nice, Horton wheels his small, portable workbench outside. If he needs to drill or sand something, he returns to his machines in the shed.

Earlier this week, his project was to work on a part for an electric servo, which will eventually control the running lights, the rudder and the propeller on his latest boat: a 1/8-scale model of a 27-foot Chris-Craft. (That means it is one-eighth the actual size of the boat.)

"I have to make sure this switch will be triggered when this wheel hits it," he said, pointing to a plastic wheel less than an inch in diameter.

That part took several hours. "I don't usually have a timetable," he said. "I don't care if I get a boat done in a week or if it takes me a couple years. I do it because it's something to do and because I like to do it."

Sometimes, he works on four or five boats at a time, gluing something here and sanding something there.

And his workshop is a scale-model builder's dream.

Not only did Horton expand his shed to twice its original size (to 8 by 12 feet), but he has hundreds of "extras" for future scale-model boats neatly stored in alphabetized plastic drawers, boxes and in a stand-up tool box -- everything from miniature anchors and portholes to winches.

"I do that for a good reason," said Horton. "Otherwise, one of the biggest problems I have with this hobby is remembering where I put things."

Saying that he makes a boat from a kit is misleading. He starts with the bare minimum and the plans from the kit. The rest is all from his own experience and imagination.

He makes his own rigging, hardware, furniture, life preservers and more.

"My wife, Norris, laughs at me sometimes," he said, "but I will work on it until I get it exactly the way I want it. I may even tear a piece apart two or three times."

Mrs. Horton, 80, said she doesn't mind. "That leaves me time for my hobbies: reading and shopping. Besides, it keeps our marriage a happy one."

In June, the couple will be married 54 years. They have lived in Florida for 25 of those years.

Horton figures he's completed about 40 boats, most of them model Chris-Crafts. He has also crafted a paddle wheel boat, several tugboats, a couple of Coast Guard boats, lifeboats, a lobster boat and others, many of which have won awards from the Bay Area Electric Boaters organization for workmanship.

He estimates he might spend as much as $300 to $500 on one boat.

One of the most unusual he ever did, Horton said, was a scale-model of a local man's 65-foot Donzi Sport Fisherman Yacht, complete with running lights and a two-channel control.

"Of course, there was no kit, so I had to take pictures of the man's boat . . . even the inside furniture," he said.

It cost Horton more than $1,000 for the materials, but he was reimbursed by the man who commissioned the project.

Although Horton now suffers from macular degeneration, a gradual weakening of the eyes, he said, "I'm gonna go until I can't."