In late 1987 the name of Alan Bond was riding very high in America, and in Australia he was a hero. "Bondy," as his country called him, was the prime mover in the syndicate that funded the design, construction and testing of Australia II, the 12-meter sloop with the controversial winged keel that swept to victory over the U.S. defender off Newport in 1983, leaving, for the first time in yachting history, an empty plinth in the New York Yacht Club where the America's Cup used to stand.
A high school dropout who emigrated from England as a boy, Bond had...