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The Shelter Island Yacht Club, established in the summer of 1886, has the distinction of being one of the oldest clubs in North America. The founding members were business and professional men from Manhattan and Brooklyn with summer residences in Shelter Island Heights. Their purpose was the furtherance of recreational sailing, racing water sports festivals, extended cruises and social fellowship. For nearly fifty years, the Shelter Island Yacht Club fleet remained a miscellany of elegant steam and sailing yachts of all sizes. The original clubhouse, built on Chequit Point in lovely Dering Harbor in 1892, was little more than one large room completely girdled by open verandas furnished with stout rocking chairs. As the membership gradually grew to 250, the clubhouse sprouted numerous additions to provide better galley, dining, dancing and docking facilities. A Junior Yacht Club, organized in the late 1920s, acquired a home of its own in 1958. The history of Shelter Island Yacht Club since World War I is reflected in a memorable succession of one design fleets: Nationals, Wee Scots, Stars, sailing dinghies, Wood Pussys, Comets, Lightnings, Blue Jays, Penguins, Lasers, Etchells, Herreshoff 12 1/2s, 420s and Optimist Pram not to mention Puffers, Sunfish and Sailfish. The club's newest one design fleet is the Stuart Knockabout. The hallmark of the Club since World War II is a solid commitment to junior sailing and, each summer of late, over 100 children participate in the Club's Junior Sailing Program.