Prairie Boat Works, Inc. was founded by George S. Hawn, JR. in 1976 in Clearwater, Florida.
Although the name Prairie is most associated with high-quality, US-built power boats, their first design, by Mr. Hawn, was the Prairie 32, a cutter-rigged monohull sailboat. About 30 of these were built, and there are reports of a larger Prairie sailboat but it’s unknown whether any were built.
In 1977 Prairie commissioned J.B. Hargrave to design a semi-displacement “trawler” style power boat, the Prairie 29. Hargrave was a well-respected designer who went on to design the famous Hatteras line.
In 1978 the larger Prairie 36 Coastal Cruiser was introduced, and by 1981 Prairie Boat Works was also known to have produced at least one Prairie 43 and six Prairie 46 Sundeck models.
In early 1982 the company closed. The molds and tooling were acquired by Atlantic Yachts which reintroduced them in 1982 as the Atlantic 30 and Atlantic 37 Double Cabin.
In 2021, it was reported that at least one set of molds for the Prairie 29 belonged to Ken Fickett and had resided at Mirage Manufacturing in Gainesville for more than 10 years.
Prairie 29 Molds – Undated Photo
Why Prairie?
To many, the word Prairie brings images of the flat grasslands of the US Midwest. What’s that got to do with boats built in Florida?
A bit of searching shows there’s also an ecosystem called a Florida Dry Prairie. According to Wikipedia, it’s a herbaceous upland plant community found in subtropical southern Florida which consists of plains covered in grasses, low shrubs, and few widely scattered trees.
In that area, there are places like Hopkin’s Prairie, Farles Prairie, Paynes Prairie and Juniper Prairie.
Boat building takes a lot of space. Perhaps the company set up shop in such a location? Or maybe the owners just liked hiking in those places.