Don Casey

For the last three decades Don Casey has been America’s most consulted authority on care of and outfitting cruising sailboats, an unlikely evolution for a motorcycle and sports car devotee growing up 1,000 miles and more from an ocean. What initiated this trajectory was a 1970 National Geographic article. Don was in his last year at the University of Texas when the October issue landed in his mailbox. In text and stunning photos, it narrated the last leg of Robin Lee Graham’s five-year solo circumnavigation aboard a 24-foot sailboat.

Don rode his BSA immediately to the University library to read the previous two articles National Geographic had published recounting the rest of the voyage. Graham was younger than Don, yet he had already experienced so much of the wider world. Suddenly a skinny black necktie and a metal desk at IBM or EDS seemed less appealing to Don than it had before the postman passed by. He began reading and acquiring books about sailing.

Seven months later, the day after his last final exam, he loaded his car with those books and his clothes and drove to Miami, where he immersed himself in everything nautical. He soon purchased a sailboat and began frequently crossing the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas islands. There an event Don was not even aware of would nudge him toward a writing career. A long-lens capture of Don on board in the far Out Islands published in a regional sailing periodical triggered an exchange of correspondence with the editor that resulted in Don penning an article for that magazine. Soon he was writing for nearly all boating magazines across the country. A book followed, then another, and so on.

Sensible Cruising: The Thoreau Approach has done for innumerable readers what the National Geographic article did for Don—revealed a previously unknown or unimagined possibility. It is a book that has changed many lives.

This Old Boat has long been the undisputed bible for selecting and outfitting a capable sailboat, and for lowering cost and improving safety by teaching the concepts and skills necessary to do most required maintenance, repair, and improvement. The Second Edition is providing the same benefits for a new generation.

Don Casey's Complete Illustrated Sailboat Maintenance Manual is actually a library of six books covering virtually all common sailboat maintenance issues. It has been described as “The definitive guide from the world's best-known sailboat maintenance expert.” Generously illustrated, it shows as well as tells. If reader reviews are to be believed, almost every owner of this hefty volume finds it indispensable.

There are eight other Don Casey books, all but one about sailing or sailboat care. That one requires special mention.

Before internet, cell phone, and DVDs, almost every cruising sailboat carried around a bag of paperback books which were traded whenever you arrived in a new anchorage or a new boat arrived in yours. Over thousands of nights at anchor, Don read scores of mystery novels, with the mediocrity of many making him wonder if he could do better. Between publication of his first marine book and his second, he gave it a shot and quickly found an enthusiastic New York publisher. Unfortunately, turmoil in the publishing industry at that time caused the manuscript to move from imprint to imprint until it disappeared altogether, never making it into print.

Having continued reading mystery novels, and having pretty much said all he has to say about sailing, Don recently returned to the idea of writing a mystery. The happy result is Marjoram & Mace, to be published in early 2024. It has garnered enthusiastic pre-publication praise, and it will be available in a Kindle version at a 1980’s paperback price. Don hopes you will take a chance on it.