Post Marine, Yachts of Quality Not Quantity from Mays Landing

Russell Post starts over

Russell Post was one of the men who created the Jersey sportfisherman. Just after World War II he and John Leek began building boats in Egg Harbor City, a venture that grew into Egg Harbor Yachts, and legend has it Post sold his own car to pay for cedar planking for the first hull. Once that business changed hands, he tried retirement only briefly. In 1957 he opened a new yard at Mays Landing, beside the Great Egg Harbor River, and adopted a motto to match: Yachts of Quality, Not Quantity.

The first Post was a 34-footer, finished that year and launched in 1958, and the founder made a habit of taking every new hull out through the local inlets himself before handing it over.

New owners, the same design rules

Charlie Walters had started at Post as a teenager, the second person Russell Post ever hired. In 1975 he and Bill Schell took ownership, and Ken Jensen, a veteran of the company, later became its president. They kept the house style intact: a tall bow with no raised trunk cabin, a sheer that sweeps down to the transom, and a broad, flat run aft that gets a boat on plane quickly and keeps fuel bills reasonable. The penalty is a firmer ride into a steep head sea, which brokers have acknowledged even as they praise how Posts attract fish.

Production stayed semi-custom and modest. By the late 1990s the range ran from 42 to 50 feet, and Marlin estimated in 2001 that the yard had turned out roughly 800 boats over four decades. Our Post 46 Convertible review covers the model that anchored the lineup for nearly two decades, and its successor, the 47.

Collapse, an asset sale and silence

The original company ran out of road in the spring of 2011, when it filed under Chapter 7. Early the next year Post Marine Group, led by John Patnovic, acquired the tooling and other assets, including molds for six models from 42 to 66 feet, and relocated them to Worton Creek Marina near Chestertown on Maryland's Eastern Shore, promising to build Posts to order and support the existing fleet. Soundings reported a year later that no new boat had yet been built or sold, and the postyachts.com address eventually showed only a placeholder. In practical terms, Post is a brokerage-only brand.

Buying into the Post fleet now

Every Post afloat is now an older yacht, which shifts the buying decision from model to individual boat. The good news is that South Jersey and Mid-Atlantic yards have decades of experience with these hulls, engines and systems are standard marine equipment, and the owner base is famously loyal, which supports resale. The caution is that a bargain price often hides a big bill, since a pair of tired diesels or a wet deck can cost more to fix than the boat is worth.

Survey priorities on any Post:

• Both diesels, with oil sampling and documented overhaul history
• Wood framing under the salon floor on older models
• Moisture in decks, cockpit and flybridge
• Engine beds, shafts, struts and rudders
• Fuel tanks, hoses and fittings, plus tower and outrigger mounts