The Thistle is a high performance one-design

One-design

One-Design is a racing method where all vehicles or boats have identical or very similar designs or models. It is also known as Spec series. It is heavily used in sailboat racing. All competitors in a race are then judged based on a single start time...

 racing dinghy

Dinghy racing

Dinghy racing is the competitive sport of sailing dinghies. Dinghy racing has affected aspects of the modern dinghy, including hull design, sail materials and sailplan, and techniques such as planing and trapezing.-Organisation of dinghy racing:...

, also used for day sailing

Dinghy sailing

Dinghy sailing is the activity of sailing small boats by using five essential controls:* the sails* the foils ....

, popular in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The Thistle was designed by Gordon K. (Sandy) Douglass

Gordon K. (Sandy) Douglass

Gordon K. "Sandy" Douglass was a racer, designer, and builder of sailing dinghies. Two of his designs, the Thistle and the Flying Scot, are among the most popular one design racing classes in the United States. The Flying Scot was inducted into the American Sailboat Hall of Fame...

 who later designed the Highlander

Highlander (dinghy)

The Highlander is a large high performance one-design racing dinghy, also used for day sailing, popular in the United States. It was designed by Gordon K. Douglass in 1949, to be a more comfortable alternative to the Thistle. The Highlander was the last boat built by the Douglass & McLeod...

 and Flying Scot

Flying Scot (dinghy)

The Flying Scot is a day sailer dinghy used for pleasure sailing as well as racing throughout North America. The Flying Scot was designed in 1957 by Gordon K...

. (These names commemorate Douglass’s Scots

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 heritage.) Starting in 1945, 4000 boats have now been built. Their construction originally used molded plywood

Plywood

Plywood is a type of manufactured timber made from thin sheets of wood veneer. It is one of the most widely used wood products. It is flexible, inexpensive, workable, re-usable, and can usually be locally manufactured...

. The builders started using Glass-reinforced polyester

Glass-reinforced plastic

Fiberglass , is a fiber reinforced polymer made of a plastic matrix reinforced by fine fibers of glass. It is also known as GFK ....

 or "fibreglass" in the late 1950s. The current hull configuration uses a glass-reinforced polyester molded boat with wooden rails, centre board trunk, thwart, fore grating, and aft

Aft

Aft, in naval terminology, is an adjective or adverb meaning, towards the stern of the ship, when the frame of reference is within the ship. Example: "Able Seaman Smith; lay aft!". Or; "What's happening aft?"...

 grating.