Bill had married Gladys Wilson in December 1932. They lived at 24 Richmond Ave, Northcote on the eastern slopes of the Northcote peninsula, walking distance from Bill’s yard.
R.M. (Roy) Wilson of the New Zealand Herald, who was married to Bertha Wilson (née Mitchelson), had commissioned Arch Logan, the doyen of New Zealand yacht building, to design a replacement for the first Little Jim (B7) for Bertha’s nephew, 22-year-old Bill Mitchelson. She had been designed by Arch and built by Logan Bros in late 1901 as a crack fishing yacht which was broken up when caught in a freak storm at Katherine Bay on the Great Barrier in December 1933.
At his small shed in Ngataringa Bay, Arch Logan, now approaching 70, did some preliminary work on the hull. Because he considered Bill Couldrey, along with Colin Wild, another Bailey & Lowe was a plum job for Bill and his staff.
