Of that time had large open cockpits. Alden designed his ocean racing schooners with them . My father in law's alden, Tradewind, didn't even have built in lockers. Merely large mohagany boxes with removable lids. The schooner Brilliant, which is in my backyard, oyster bay , for the spring classic racing series has a large cockpit also. Brilliant is a S&S design. Maybe the thought was it gave the crew room to lounge on the long passages these boats made. Alot of these boats were either designed for, or were variants of boats that did races such as the newport to bermuda race