For the first time in the nearly century-long history of Huckins Yacht Corp., the business is going to be owned and operated by someone who is not in the family of founder Frank Pembroke Huckins.

On Tuesday, his granddaughter, Cindy Purcell — who has overseen Huckins for more than 50 years with her husband, Buddy Purcell — said the family business is planning a transition to new ownership.

Andy Tyska, founder and CEO of Bristol Marine, will take the helm as soon as the deal officially closes. Tyska estimates that timeframe as the next four or five weeks, adding that Huckins employees were notified about two weeks ago.

“I feel good about who we’re selling the company to,” Cindy Purcell told Soundings Trade Only. “These days, sometimes people that take over your business aren’t so great, but I feel very good about this.”

Huckins is a historic yard in the boating industry, having produced one of the world’s first planing hulls in 1928. The brand is also synonymous with its Quadraconic hull form, which is designed for performance at all speeds.

Bristol Marine, which has locations in Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Maine, was founded in 1998. Tyska has focused on growing the company in ways that help to sustain and support working waterfronts and skilled craftsmen.

Huckins is a perfect fit with that vision, Tyska says. “It gives me the chills, to be honest with you, because it is such an iconic brand and presence in the industry, representing not just innovation but quality. To be able to do this in a manner which doesn’t involve big private equity, large-scale corporatization of the brand, I think is unique and pretty special.”

Purcell says her enthusiasm about the sale is in part because she and Buddy will remain involved with Huckins. She is 78 years old, and her husband is 81.

“It’s not like we’re getting kicked out or anything,” she says. “Buddy’s going to stay on for as long as he feels good, and I’m going to be a consultant. We won’t have the headaches that you have with running a business, but we’ll be able to be around.”

Purcell also says she is confident that Tyska, who is 52, can carry the Huckins brand forward. He earned a degree in naval architecture from the University of Michigan, worked as a naval architect for Ted Hood, and has more than a quarter-century of experience running boatyards.

“We had other options, but they weren’t a good fit,” Purcell says. “He runs three service yards in New England. They are very similar to our yard. We feel very comfortable that he will run a very good service business and, possibly down the road, do some new construction.”

The parties came together through Andy Giblin, a wooden-boat restorer in Connecticut whom Tyska has known for decades. One of Giblin’s customers owns a Huckins boat. They got to talking about the future of the Huckins company, and Tyska’s name came up.

“My friend Andy introduced the customer to me over a year ago, and we had a really positive, high-level conversation around the purpose of a potential transition of the company into new hands,” Tyska says. “And then he introduced me to Cindy and Buddy.”

Going forward, the Huckins yard in Jacksonville, Fla., is expected to continue operating as it does now. General manager Sara Gielow will continue to lead day-to-day operations, with service manager PJ Rogerswill staying on board, too.

“We have no ideas about changing anything at that location. Our operations will continue to be centered around repairs, refits and restorations,” Tyska says.

That’s not to say there won’t be evolution in the future, he adds.

“I do have the boatbuilding bug, and I look forward to the next year or two, doing a lot of listening to current Huckins owners about the experience with the boat they have now and what they see as the future of Huckins,” Tyska says. “I’ll do a lot of listening and data collection, and of course dream about getting a new Huckins model in the water in the future, without question.”