JOHNSON, Peter (Colpoys Paley) 1930-2003

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born March 26, 1930, in London, England; died May 24, 2003, in Lymington, Hampshire, England. Yachtsman, publisher, and author. Johnson was an important figure in British yachting, being instrumental in creating rules that governed the sport, and was a founder of Nautical Publishing. Holding the title of seventh baronet of New York in North America, a title that dates back to his eighteenth-century ancestor Colonel William Johnson, Johnson attended Wellington College and then the Royal Military College of Science. Commissioned an officer in the Royal Artillery in 1949, he served in Egypt and Cyprus and was on the Mediterranean staff before resigning his commission in 1961. After working a few years for the Bordon Chemical Co., he became director of Sea Sure Ltd. in 1965, a yachting equipment company. From that point on, his business and personal life were dominated by his love for yachting. He became head of the Junior Offshore Group and joined the Royal Yachting Association and the Royal Ocean Racing Club. Johnson was also a founder of the World Speed Sailing Record Council, a group charged with verifying claims concerning the setting of speed records. As a member of the international technical committee for the Offshore Racing Council, he helped established rules in the 1970s that still governed the sport decades later. In 1970 Johnson became director and editor of Nautical Publishing, which he cofounded. When the publishing company was sold in 1981, he joined the Haynes Publishing Group as editor of yachting books until he retired in 1991. Johnson was a prolific author of articles on boating, which he contributed to such periodicals as Yachting World, and was the author of several books on yachting, including The Guinness Book of Yachting Facts and Feats (1975), The Guinness Guide to Sailing (1981), The Encyclopedia of Yachting (1989), and Yacht Racing: Speed, Success, Failure (1997).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

BOOKS

Writers Directory, 18th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 2003.

PERIODICALS

Daily Telegraph (London, England), May 29, 2003.

Independent (London, England), June 14, 2003, p. 17.

Times (London, England), June 19, 2003, p. 34.