(click to enlarge photos)

Published in The Seattle Times online on April 23, 2026
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on April 26, 2025

Seattle family sails a Norwegian racer through its centennial year

By Jean Sherrard

Is there anything more graceful than a wind-filled sail — half an angel’s wing, completed in reflection?

For nearly 90 years, the Giese family has piloted that grace across Northwest inland waters aboard the Oslo, a 36-foot classic sailboat of the Six Metre racing class once sailed by Norway’s Crown Prince Olav, later King Olav V.

In the politically turbulent summer of 1936, German-born Hans

Otto Giese (known by his middle name) and his Norwegian American wife, Borghild (“Borgy” to friends and family) crossed the Atlantic by steamship on their honeymoon, visiting relatives in Germany and Norway.

Convinced that a sleek sailboat’s elegant lines were perfectly suited to Puget Sound’s light air, Otto went shopping in Norway. In Trondheim he found the Oslo — 10 years old, built for the crown prince by designer Johan Anker and boatbuilder Christian Jensen. Otto bought her on the spot for $1,650, delivered to Seattle.

When the Oslo arrived in 1937, her mahogany planks had shrunk so badly they showed daylight. She was met at the dock by Anchor Jensen of Jensen Motor Boat — coincidentally sharing the same name as the Oslo’s Norwegian builders, who later built Seattle’s renowned Slo-Mo-Shun hydroplanes. For 50-plus years, Jensen cared for the Oslo: Mast down each fall, into the shed. Mast up each spring.

Each season, the Oslo proved herself, winning races across the region. So infectious was Otto’s enthusiasm that by the 1960s

Seattle boasted one of the largest Six Metre fleets in the world — 18 boats on the starting line each Wednesday night off Leschi. As Otto and Borgy raised their six children, the boat became part racer, part floating campground.

“We were potty-trained and Oslo-trained,” says son Peter Giese, youngest of the siblings. “With Captain Otto,” his brother Emil says, “we were racing competitively and cruising for discovery.” Their brother Stephen recalls the boat as “a member of the family, getting us through wonderful and sometimes hair-raising situations.”

After the war, Otto helped establish Seattle’s Corinthian Yacht Club, where, in his words, members were “athletes, not society people.” He remained at the Oslo’s helm well into his 80s, racing her for the last time at the 1985 Shaw Island Classic. He died the next year.

Today, the siblings who grew up on the sailboat boast other passions and with Otto’s unsentimental clarity have decided to sell. On May 2, the Oslo will make her final Opening Day parade under Giese family colors.

A boat built for a prince became, in time, a vessel of family memory, its seraph’s wing still catching the wind.

WEB EXTRAS

For our narrated 360 video, captured off of Leschi on Lake Washington, head over here.

Below see more photos of the Giese family, including the magical Oslo under sail, even if on a near windless March day.