Number 203 December 2013 THE BOAT MUSEUM SOCIETY President: Di Skilbeck MBE Vice-Presidents: Alan Jones, Harry Arnold MBE, Tony Lewery DIRECTORS Chairman Chris Kay 07952 032935 Rosecroft, Bromborough, Wirral. CH62 6ET Vice-Chairman Will Manning 01244 403194 5 Westminster Court, Philip Street, Chester. CH2 3BF Vice-Chairman John Yates 01939 234754 8 Market Street, Wem, Shropshire. SY4 5EA Treasurer Barbara Kay 07952 032935 3 Rosecroft, Bromborough, Wirral. CH62 6ET Membership Barbara Catford 0151 353 8758 17 The Looms, Parkgate, Neston, Wirral. CH64 6RE Secretary Lynn Potts 0151 625 1244 58 Frankby Road, West Kirby, Wirral. CH48 6EF Terry Allen 0151 334 8058 8 Shetland Drive, Bromborough, Wirral. CH62 7JZ Ken Catford 0151 353 8758 17 The Looms, Parkgate, Neston, Wirral. CH64 6RE Stuart Gardiner 01928 733040 5 Greenacres, Frodsham, Ches. WA6 6BU Steve Stamp 0151 334 5714 24 Wirral Gardens, Bebington, Wirral. CH63 3BQ Cath Turpin 0151 632 5446 1 Market Street, Hoylake, Wirral. CH47 2AD Mike Turpin 0151 632 5446 1 Market Street, Hoylake, Wirral. CH47 2AD OTHER CO-OPTED COMMITTEE MEMBERS Andy Wood [Re:Port Editor] 0151 334 2209 34 Langdale Road, Bebington, Wirral. CH63 3AW email: [email protected] Sue Phillips 07745134160 8 Newbury Way, Moreton, Wirral. CH46 1PW Martyn Kerry 07715816768 8 Newbury Way, Moreton, Wirral. CH46 1PW Bob Thomas 01928 733061 32 Springbourne, Frodsham, Ches. WA6 6QD Ian Posnett 07414983946 5 Cygnett Close, Great Sutton, Ches. CH66 3TB Jeff Fairweather 07909990880 6 Thornton Road, Ellesmere Port, CH65 5DF CONTACTS TO WHOM CONTRIBUTIONS SHOULD BE SENT Publicity/ Ailsa Rutherford 01352 756164 14 Tai Maes, Mold, Flintshire Museum Times CH7 1RW. email [email protected] Website Sue Phillips 07745134160 8 Newbury Way, Moreton, Wirral. CH46 1PW On production of a current BMS membership card, members are entitled to free admission to the National Waterways Museum, Gloucester and the Stoke Bruerne Canal Museum. The Boat Museum Society is a company limited by guarantee, registered in England Number 1028599. Registered Charity Number 501593 he National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, CH65 4FW. Telephone: 0151 355 5017 Visit our website www.boatmuseumsociety.org.uk Cover: Netherton Tunnel has towpaths on both sides, and was originally lit by gas. Number 201 RE:PORT Number 203 December 2013 CHAIRMAN’S REPORT This issue's Chairman's Report is written in the somewhat unusual circumstance that when you read it, I will no longer be Chairman. I am standing down from the 1st December after two years in office and Jeff Fairweather will take up the role as the new Chairman. I think Jeff will do an excellent job in guiding and supporting the work of the Society. He will also continue to lead the task of identifying the new emerging role for the Society in its partnership working with the Canal & River Trust and the task of delivering the implementation of any new procedures that are agreed. I have looked back to my first Chairman's Report written two years ago to see if my initial thoughts about the opportunities and challenges that I was about to encounter did materialise in reality, and whether there were any other issues that arose which I did not foresee. Reflecting on that period, I think that the move to the Canal & River Trust in July 2012 has been of significant benefit, and the Museum itself has certainly benefited from a huge capital injection of over £1.5m for building maintenance and renovation over the next twelve to eighteen months. Any new large organisation which rises out of the ashes of an old one will go through a transition period, getting to grips with the changes necessary to operate efficiently in the new environment. This has been the case with the new Trust but progress has been made in identifying those areas which need developing and we have supported the Trust in putting them into practice. There is still a little way to go yet but the new Trust's Chief Executive, Richard Parry, has already started to review how effectively the Trust is operating in practice, and we have also seen a number of recent management rationalisations within the Museums and Attractions Group introduced by Debbie Lumb, who is the Head of the Group for the Trust. I am very pleased that, throughout the transition process, the Society and its members have provided very positive support in their involvement in Contributions for RE:PORT, which is published four times a year, are always welcome Copy Date for RE:PORT 204 - Wed 19th February All views expressed in RE:PORT are those of the contributors concerned and should not be taken as being the policy of the Boat Museum Society, the National Waterways Museum or the Canal & River Trust. - 3 - RE:PORT Number 203 both the work of the Museum and the Trust. One issue which has been particularly highlighted during my period of office has been the steady decline in the membership of the Society. By contrast, there have been a good number of new volunteers coming forward to work at the Museum, but few of them have gone on beyond their first year's free membership to join the Society. Part of the work that Jeff is leading on is targeted at identifying the reasons for this decline and bringing forward opportunities to stimulate new membership. On a final note I would just like to pay tribute to all the active members of the Society who make it a living, breathing, dynamic organisation. Without your active involvement, the Society could not operate or command the respect that it does within the Canal & River Trust. Chairmen will come and go, but that dedicated body of active members is the crucial element in making the Society a success. I wish you all a Happy Christmas and very best wishes for the New Year. Chris Kay Plan to Transform Welsh Canals CANALS IN WALES could become world class tourist attractions over the next decade, as well as provide jobs and support for the country’s economy. Edwina Hart MBE, Minister for Economy, Science and Transport, welcomed the proposals from Glandŵr Cymru ­ the Canal & River Trust in Wales ­ which unveiled a ten-year strategy to support its ambitious aims at the Senedd in Cardiff. The aims in the next decade include supporting the restoration of 17 miles of the Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal, to connect the Brecon Beacons to the sea. The £70m project would provide jobs and training as well supporting the nation’s 200-year industrial heritage. Dr Mark Lang, chair of Glandŵr Cymru, says, “Now, with the waterways outside Westminster control for the first time since the Second World War, we want to ensure they are at the very heart of supporting Welsh business [and] tourism.” Two Jolly ‘Tars’: Spey and Gifford at Chester 25th July 2013 Norman Stainthorp AN HISTORIC SITE, the old Chester Canal, on the line of the defensive ditch outside the Roman Fort, a base for the famous 20th Legion for hundreds of years until the collapse of the Roman Empire around 400 AD – but wait, what is this? – only a little less historic, but more precious because a sight more fleeting – a pair of Thomas Clayton ‘tar’ boats making their way south from Ellesmere Port. Visitors to Chester, travelling thousands of miles to see historic Chester, looked blindly down from the Northgate, not realising the significance of the two boats - 4 - Number 203 RE:PORT passing beneath their feet. Below them was a recreation of a once humdrum, almost daily sight of Thomas Clayton tanker craft, which from the 1920s until the mid-1950s, had carried oil products from Stanlow Oil Refinery on the Manchester Ship Canal, near Ellesmere Port, to various industrial sites in the Midlands, such as the Shell Mex Depot at Langley Green, not far from their home base at Oldbury Junction, known by the boatmen, as ‘The Crow’ on the Birmingham canal old main line. The Clayton oil traffic was particularly significant to the history of the canal port at Ellesmere Port, as it was one of the last regular traffic through the Port, hanging on until as late as the mid-1950’s, after which the Port [Photo: Norman Stainthorp] fell silent until the beginning of leisure traffic in the 1960’s. After years of benign neglect, the remains of the Port was recognised for its architectural and historic value to be saved in the 1970s, as a home for NWMIN’s collection of former working canal craft. (NWMIN was the forerunner of BMS) To see a pair of boats like this briefly recreating the traffic that had been part of the scenery for nearly 50 years, was, because so fleeting, a more fragile historic sight than the historic walls they were passing. The motor, Spey, privately owned, is powered by a 15 nhp Bolinder semi-diesel engine, with its distinctive irregular exhaust note, created by the ‘on demand’ hit-and- miss fuel supply system; a sound beloved of all true canal boat enthusiasts. To hear it echoing off the Roman fortress walls, paired with this Society’s former horse drawn tanker boat, Gifford evoked a truly memorable scene. The crew of Spey had brought their boat to Ellesmere Port in order to pair up with Gifford to attend the boat festival at Audlem on 27-28th July on the Shropshire Union main line outside the ‘Shroppie Fly’ pub. Spey was one of the craft which attended the opening of the then Boat Museum in 1976 and has towed Gifford a number of times since, including on the Thames in 1977. After the event, Spey towed Gifford back to Ellesmere Port - empty of course as they would have been when travelling 'down north'.