 The sloop was commissioned by a Vancouver Island printer who had made some money from an investment in the Minto Mine in British Columbia, and hence he named the sloop "Minto".After returning from World War II in 1946 Rob Wittlesey purchased the Minto and shortly thereafter traded the skiff, with "MINTO RVYC" carved into its transom, to Bob Schoen of Orcas Island for a smaller dinghy.The Minto skiff eventually got stored in Bob's barn, where his friend Heine Dole, a NW marine architect, saw it and convinced Bob it would make a great dinghy reproduced in fiberglass.