PHOTO COURTESY PLAYCRAFT

Jimmie Darrell “Jim” Dorris, a veteran of the recreational boating industry and founder of PlayCraft Boats, died Dec. 9 in Kissimmee, Fla., at the age of 78.

The family said in a statement, “Jim Dorris loved boating. On July 23, 1977, Jim was united in marriage with the love of his life and forever best friend, Carolyn Merritt, and together they have shared forty-five years of love, laughter and precious memories.”

The son of Darrell and Mary Scales Dorris, Jim Dorris was born in Morton, Miss., on April 25, 1944. He graduated from high school in Morton, and briefly attended junior college before joining the Army National Guard where he served until he was honorably discharged in 1969.

The year before, he started building MonArk boats in Arkansas and in 1972, Dorris relocated to Missouri to work for Appleby Aluminum Boats. He started his own company, Charger Boats, in 1974.

After 20 years of building boats, Dorris started thinking of ways to combine the comfort and passenger capacity of a pontoon boat with higher performance. The Hydrotoon design evolved into the PowerToon, one of the first triple-toon designs, and PlayCraft Boats was born.

Among the milestones for the company was that PlayCraft was the first pontoon-boat manufacturer to enter the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout with a pontoon boat powered by a 350-cubic-inch, V-8 sterndrive. In addition, the boat’s structure was reinforced, and it had what Dorris called Rac-R-Fins. That boat ran 46.8 mph, which was the first of many records that PlayCraft set at the shootout.

The next milestone for PlayCraft came in 2001 at Mercury’s Lake X test facility in Florida when Dorris ran 81 mph. That was followed in 2010 when PlayCraft was considered by most to be the first pontoon boat to top 100 mph. The Dorris family has played a prominent role in the annual Lake of the Ozarks Shootout, one of the largest performance-boat events in the country.

Dorris is survived by Carolyn; Joe Dorris and his wife Kim of Lebanon, Mo., and David Dorris of Camdenton, Mo.; his daughter-in-law Betty Doris of Springfield, Mo.; seven grandchildren, J.T. Dorris and his wife Melissa, Nicholas Dorris, Kaylee Dorris and fiancé Devante Chew, Kyle Dorris and his wife Ally, Kolby Dorris, Paige Dorris, Chance DeVos and two step-grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his parents and two sons, Jimmie Darrell “Bo” Dorris, Jr., and Vince DeVos.