Happy birthday, CYC! The Club was founded on August 7, 1875. The first 37 members who formally organized the club that day paid a $5 initiation fee, with annual dues of $4. Of course, fees and dues have gone up a bit since then!

The Chicago Yacht Club was founded to encourage and promote the sport of yachting, yacht building and to conduct world-class sailing competitions and yachting activities.
That was our charter in 1875, and it remains so today. 150 years later, the Chicago Yacht Club is ranked as one of the top five yacht clubs in the U.S. and is the host of the iconic Race to Mackinac presented by Wintrust, one of the largest offshore races in the world and the longest annual freshwater race.

CYC is commemorating this notable year in several ways:

• Design of a special logo that appears on all Club publications and merchandise and is incorporated into all Club events and member groups’ own logos this year.
• A section of our website dedicated to our history that includes video interviews with our longest-standing members, a timeline, selected photos, a collection of “Sailor Stories” about what the Club means to members, and more.
• A series of events throughout the year, including a “Top Talks from Those in the Know” lecture series, a legendary Pirate Ball recalling the glamour and fun of this gala costume event that took place annually for many years in the 1920s, and a family Clambake to close out the season.
• Our signature event, the Chicago Yacht Club Race to Mackinac presented by Wintrust, featured a special turning mark in 2025, the 116th running of the race. The “Lakeshore Legacy Mark,” approximately four miles north of the start off Chicago’s Navy Pier, brought all racers along the Chicago lakefront in the “Skyline Sprint,” enabling maximum spectating opportunity. Once up on Mackinac Island, the festivities culminated in a fireworks show sponsored by the Storm Trysail Foundation.

We are looking forward to the next 150 years of boating, and spending time at our home on the water, the Chicago Yacht Club.