First purpose-built lifeboat

Although there are earlier cases of vessels serving the function of lifeboats, the first purpose-built lifeboat was the Original, made in 1790 by shipbuilder Henry Francis Greathead (UK) at the South Shields boatyard in Tyne and Wear, UK. The wooden vessel, with an interior lined with cork and copper, measured 9 metres (29 feet 6 inches) long, 3 metres (9 feet 10 inches) wide and could accommodate 20 people (inclusive of a crew of 12). The Original first saw action on 30 January 1790, rescuing the survivors of a shipwreck marooned on Herd Sand in South Tyneside.

The impetus to design a purpose-built lifeboat came in the wake of the shipwreck of the Adventure in the estuary of the River Tyne during a violent storm in 1789 that prevented any rescue attempt in standard vessels, resulting in the entire crew perishing. Local officials organized a competition calling for the design of a lifeboat to prevent such tragedies happening again. Two of the most promising entries were submitted by boatbuilder Henry Francis Greathead and parish clerk William Wouldhave, though neither was quite perfect, so their ideas were combined to produce the concept for the Original, though a disgruntled Wouldhave refused the half prize money he was offered and construction of the final vessel fell solely to Greathead.

The Original built on the work of several other boats which had been converted into lifeboats with special adaptations. An "unimmergible boat" was patented by Lionel Lukin (UK), a coach-builder in Long Acre, London, UK, on 2 November 1785. The following year, the innovations in his "unsinkable" vessel design were adapted by Lukin for a coble fishing boat, under commission by Dr John Sharp of Bamburgh, Northumberland, UK, which went on to serve as a lifeboat on the wild Northumberland coastline for several years. There are also reports dating to 1777 of a boat at Formby in Lancashire having a boat that was used to row out to ships in distress.

In his quest to design an "unsinkable" boat, Lukin conducted a number of experiments with a Norwegian yawl sailing boat on the River Thames. He used lightweight materials such as cork and included buoyant gunwales air-filled compartments in the bulkheads, as well as an iron keel to provide greater stability.

Greathead would go on to build 30 further models based on the Original's design. No.11 of 31, the Zetland, is the oldest surviving lifeboat today. It is now housed at the Zetland Lifeboat Museum in Redcar, North Yorkshire, UK.