While the M-Class actually came into existence with the dawn of the Universal Rule in 1903, the class really gained its fame in the late 1920s.
At that time, a group of members of the New York Yacht Club were looking about for some suitable replacement for their aging and outmoded NYYC 50 (waterline) class, and someone hit on the idea of Class M to the Universal Rule. Harold Vanderbilt, later to defend the America’s Cup three times in the larger J Class, commissioned W. Starling Burgess to design Prestige to the M-Class. Junius Morgan built Windward to a design he worked out with Charles Mower, and others joined the project as well. Several members modernized their NYYC 50s to sail with the M Class, notably Clinton Crane, and so the M-Class as we think of it today came into being.
Information courtesy of Mclassyachts.com
