Baby Bootlegger hugs a turn in the 1924 Gold Challenge Cup race in Detroit.

Mark Mason had bought, restored and sold many of the old racing boats of the twenties, but the one that he had always wanted to own was Baby Bootlegger, which had won the '24 and '25 Gold Cup race. Today, the Gold Cup race is an unlimited class with Miss Budweiser and other powerful boats. The race began as a free-for-all in the early part of the century, but the boats developed into grotesquely overpowered creatures with three and four V-12 Liberty engines. The race was changed in the twenties into a class with a requirement for four seats, one engine and a limit on engine size. It was to be a 'gentleman's run-about', and Baby Bootlegger was the pinnacle boat of this group.

Baby Bootlegger was designed by George Crouch-a man whose bespeckled American Gothic countenance more resembled that of a dry-goods clerk than the pre-eminent speedboat designer of his day-for a wealthy Wall Street bachelor named Caleb Bragg who, among other things, put money into Broadway musicals.