Fairmile Marine was a British boat building company founded in 1939 by the car manufacturer Noel Macklin. Macklin used the garage at his home at Cobham Fairmile in Surrey for manufacturing assembly which is why the boats he designed came to be called Fairmiles. As a former Royal Horse Artillery and Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve officer he was inspired to turn his talents and his technical staff to producing boats after reading an article by Vice-Admiral Cecil Vivian Usborne. Many Fairmile Bs were built in Commonwealth countries: 80 in Canada, 12 in New Zealand, and 6 in South Africa.