How close a cousin is the Roamer to the Commander? Well, my 1966 fiberglass Commander was built at the Roamer plant, and as a result the serial number is FXA 38 3004 R (the "R" stands for Roamer) Therefore there's a little bit of Roamer in every Commander, and I dare say some of the boats that still exist out there today share wood from the same sheet of plywood.
The Roamer guys have a nice web site, it can be found here
http://www.geocities.com/alloyed2sea/
( the link to The CHRIS CRAFT ROAMER CLUB )
Here's their Roamer of the Month

There are most certainly some strong family resemblences here, assuming a certain Mr. Dick Avery had a hand in these boats as well. Anyone out there with info about the Roamer, please feel free to post it here and/or at the Roamer site. We would like to think of these guys as our extended family members, and we know some of our Commander owners of years past, Mark Young being an example, have traded in his nice Commander in favor of a Roamer.
I'm showing a few photos here to wet your interest, but there's a lot of good info about the Roamer boats there, and some information that is common to the Commander series too.
Welcome Roamer owners!
Regards, Paul
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