Founded by Jack Jensen, the company first sold the centerboard LAPWORTH 24 designed by Bill Lapworth. The Lapworth's 24 sold well. The name was first changed to CALIFORNIA 24 and then CAL 24. The name Cal stuck with the company until it closed in 1986.
Jensen hired Lapworth to design several more yachts including the first of three 27 footers, a pop-top racer/cruiser with a nine foot beam.
Cal's business continued to boom and Lapworth designed several more hulls for Jensen Marine.
The CAL 40 was introduced in 1963. These yachts became one of the most celebrated production racings yachts of all time.
Bangor Punta purchased Jensen Marine in 1965*. The Cal Yacht factory was moved to Tampa, Florida in January of 1980. The factory remained in Tampa until March of 1985. It was then moved to Fall River, Massachusetts and was managed by Jim Hunt, son of yacht designer C. Raymond Hunt. Bangor Punta also owned O'Day Yachts and Prindle Catamarans.
Later there was Siegler Marine, Starcraft Sailboat Products, and then finally just Cal Boats. So if we include all the later takeovers, Cals continued to be built until 1989.
(Eds. note: An attempt was made to list the boats as they were named by the manufacturer. For example, the second version of the CAL 30 was called the CAL 2-30. In cases where a later model used the same name as an ealier one, the boat is listed here with a unique identifier in parenthisis, such as CAL 24 (HUNT)to designate it as a separate model.)
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