During the 1950s and 1960s freight transport on the canals declined rapidly in the face of mass road transport. Coal was still being delivered to waterside factories that had no other convenient access. But many factories that had formerly used coal either switched to using other fuels, often because of the Clean Air Act 1956, or closed completely. Census- Age 7, at Crowle, River Trent at Amcotts, on board the vessel Agile with his uncle James White and aunt Annie (nee Oliver, later known as Grandma White) When Trent Carriers wrapped up Dad went to work for British Waterways on the BACCAT until his retirement.

Main trade for keels was merchandise and raw materials from Hull to the industrial towns and cities. The return cargoes included coal, pitch, slag, steel and other finished products. Sometimes we loaded a cargo of Trent sand and gravel dredged from the bed of the river by hand; the skipper would pay all expenses and when loaded the cargo belonged to him. He would then sell it to the best market, his customers being corporations, builders’ merchants and contractors. The riverfront has become much more of a leisure destination than APH describes. A slightly annoying feature is that river wall has a pointed top, so you can’t sit on it or rest a drink on it. The wall looks new, but it annoys Jane in the novel. In The Water Gipsies , living on a boat was the recourse of the poor. Now it’s a middle-class option, and a mooring at Hammersmith is highly desirable. Some of the houseboats are former canal boats like Fred and Jane’s with the cargo space converted to cabins. Next morning we started about 4.30, the horse pulling us up the shallow and narrow canal. It was as dark as a grave, except where lit by the glare of glass-houses and forges built on the canal banks. As we approached the glass-houses of Mexborough and Swinton we could hear the workmen singing like a choir. We glided by and a large red glow suddenly appeared; I could see men with long tubes in their mouths blowing bottles and other glassware-a strange sight for a lad so early on a winter’s morning.

Abstract

It’s a very close community. It is quite peaceful and tranquil down here and as far as I’m aware there is no abandoned boats down here. If there is they are in the boatyard not the actual Marina.

Lament for the Keel (3) This article concludes the reminiscences of the author, a North-countryman who The guy obviously has a grudge against the marina," she said. "It creates a bad name to people living on boats and I think a few years ago it was a cheap option, but it is certainly not now. Read More Related Articles Friends told Mum of a house to become vacant in Kenyon Street. Dad went to see it and we moved in two weeks later, but we were destined not to stay there very long. A Mr and Mrs Chester, with their daughter Ethel, one of our friends, had a house at Waterside. They were going to move to a large house in Orchard Street called Tenby House, quite near to Mr Chester's work. Dad jumped at the chance to live at Waterside, only a stone's throw from the river and Mill. So when I was still 7 years old, we moved yet again. It was a lovely house, standing on its own.

In the early 1900s the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Canal was alive with these small craft, loaded with all kinds of merchandise and minerals, hailing from Thorne, Stainforth, Hull, Goole, Beverley – in fact, lots of small villages on the banks of the Ouse, Hull and Trent, and navigations connecting them. It was a fine sight to see these craft in June, around Thorne Fair time, when standing on the canal bank. At Thorne, the keels lay moored there with their burgees, and bunting flying. Men were painting and fettling them, and getting things ship-shape. The mainsail was made of heavy cotton or flax canvas and sewn by hand. It was square at the head with gores run in from the foot to form its shape and clews. It had a head rope stitched in at the top, a larger leech rope at the sides, and a larger footrope at the bottom, all of which formed the bolt rope. It also had six main thimbles stitched in named two-head thimbles, two bowline thimbles and two larger thimbles for the main clews. There were also thimbles worked in to lace the canvas to the yards and two small thimbles at the foot for the truss line, used for shortening the sail. Each keel, of course, had a name and what a collection they were. When I first went on board they ranged from Adamto Togo, the victorious photo 75 kind permission Thorne Local History Society "The sound of someone hailing 'Keel – a – hoy. Are you there, Captain? Come ahead with that keel' faded away about 1940. We are told all of Jane’s thoughts and those of the other characters as necessary. The author gives his own opinion directly as well as through the thoughts of Gordon Bryan, a wealthy artist who has a studio on the Hammersmith riverfront. Jane’s thoughts are simple; she never questions her own thoughts. Mr Bryan constantly asks himself why he thinks as he does. This presumably represents their difference in class.

And now, with George, Arthur and Elsie married and away from home, I began my life as a Keel Girl and the Captain's Mate, at the age of nearly fifteen. Dad said to me, 'How long are you going to stay as Mate with me? George was with me nearly five years, Arthur three, Elsie one year – so now it's your turn'. 'Well Dad', I said, 'You have worked and brought me up for over fourteen years, so I will try to repay you. I will help you all I can for fourteen years'. The years rolled on, and I was Dad’s Mate for nearly eighteen, so I think I really and truly earned the name of Captain's Mate. MARFLEET was skippered by my grandfather William Rhodes and was owned by Richardson of Hull. She was a Weighton boat but he gave up sailing when she was de-rigged and a motor was installed. I do not know when this took place as all my relatives from Hull are now deceased. My father crewed for Bill for a number of years before coming to London to join the Met Police 1931. a b Russell, Ronald. (1983) Lost Canals & Waterways of Britain, Sphere Books Ltd, ISBN 0-7221-7562-0Faced with financial ruin with the main worker of the family incapacitated Maryann must fend for herself with the casual help of Bobby, one of their workers on the boat. Maryann Bartholomew is a boatwoman, married to a born and bred boatman though she struggles being not born to the life she tries hard to be a good wife and help to her husband Joel.

Now that we had a bigger house, Mum and Dad's brothers and sisters used to visit us often. At Fair time we had to put children in our room, aunts in another, uncles with Dad in another. What a full house we used to have! Baking day was a headache, the day before the fair. Our visitors did not let us know they were coming; they just popped in saying 'Here we are'. Mother used to be up early getting the oven hot and the pastry made. All were coal fires and ovens; no electric or gas ones then. As soon as breakfast was over, out came all the baking items. I had to dust and grease the tins, getting them into line for the tarts, etc. It was not long before we had trays of ground rice tarts, jam, lemon curd, buns of every description, sponge cakes, teacakes, spice loaves, currant bread and pies of every kind. There were also flat-cakes, or flattie-cakes which, because they had no baking powder in, always stayed flat, never rose up. Dad used to say, 'It’s a good job the Fair only comes once a year’. John Wilson is a lifelong enthusiast for London the city and for London in literature, art and film. He came to London to study Physics at Imperial College and has lived in various parts of the city ever since.Within Scotland, the Forth and Clyde Canal and the Union Canal connected the major cities in the industrial Central Belt; they also provide a short cut for boats to cross between the west and the east without a sea voyage. The Caledonian Canal provided a similar function in the Highlands of Scotland. There has also been a movement to redevelop canals in inner city areas, such as Birmingham, Manchester, Salford and Sheffield, which have both numerous waterways and urban blight. In these cities, waterways redevelopment provides a focus for successful commercial/residential developments such as Gas Street Basin in Birmingham, Castlefield Basin and Salford Quays in Manchester, Victoria Quays in Sheffield. However, these developments are sometimes controversial. In 2005 environmentalists complained that housing developments on London's waterways threatened the vitality of the canal system. [21] The Falkirk Wheel At that time there were dozens of keels laid alongside in tiers six or seven abreast, waiting their turn to discharge to the different owners. I recollect my father, on one of these trips, pointing out to me the place where the sloop Masterman capsized and sank with the skipper's wife and two children in the cabin, after striking Witton Sand end on the previous spring tide. The Masterman and her ill-fated passengers were never seen again. Landes, David S. (1969). The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present. Cambridge, New York: Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge. ISBN 978-0-521-09418-4. The Canals Collection at the Cadbury Research Library (University of Birmingham) contains archive materials relating to Midlands canals in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. [25] See also [ edit ]