Change and decay in all around I see.

[Kukri]

Fifty years ago there were boatbuilders and chandlers everywhere. They have nearly all gone.

I remember buying two sets of Musto Ocean oilskins (very different to today’s) at a chandlery in Orford, and spares for a Baby Blake at Whisstocks chandlery in Woodbridge, in 1984. West Mersea had three boatbuilders - Wyatts, Clarke & Carter and Ben JG Clarke - in 1970.

I suppose it was the replacement of wood by plastic and the consequent drying up of repair business that did for the small boatbuilders. The London chandlers creamed off business from the coastal chandlers and were in turn wiped out by the Internet.

This has come to pass in my sailing lifetime.

 

[oldgit]

Do remember that smell of damp which pervaded all my Dads wooden boats and the constant battle to stop them rotting back to their natural state.
Me, I prefer to boat not mend.

 

[Kukri]

Remember all those cryptic notations in “East Coast Rivers” … HWFC 12.00, FW top of hard, EC Wed…”

Tony Ward’s Pin Mill emporium where you started outside with “Two gallons of Stuart Turner”, and I suspected that if you ever got right to the back of that Aladdin’s cave you would have found spares for your Rippingille No.3, wrapped in oiled paper.

Cook’s sailmakers at Maldon. North Fambridge Yacht Station. Arthur Holt at Heybridge..

 

[Leighb]

Lots of more traditional yards in Woodbridge still. Eversons, Robertson’s, Larkmans. Lovely smell of wood being worked outside Eversons as you walk past.

 

[fredrussell]

“…and we were lucky.”

 

[johnalison]

I remember with affection most of the establishments mentioned, especially Wards at Pin Mill and Jack Holt at Heybridge, where we started cruising under the watchful eyes of George Clarke.

One place that is no longer with us is the old sail loft in Ipswich dock, whose name I've forgotten. They used to mainly make sails for barges. In our first year with our Cirrus I hoisted a radar reflector before crossing the dreaded Harwich harbour. Unfortunately, it caused a small tear in the jib. This was before yachtsmen carried sail-mending tape, so I was reduced to finding a sailmaker. Taking the sail and my 5-yr-old son on a train, I went into this august establishment with my pathetic bit of cloth. The man at the desk sneered at it and said that the sailmaker was away but that I might like to ask his deputy. We went up about four flights of stairs to the loft the size of a rugby pitch, where three gnomes sat around making grommetty things, and I went to the sailmaker. He also sneered at my cloth but agreed to patch it. He stitched a rectangle of cloth over the tear, cut out a smaller rectangle, and sewed the seam neatly. He said something like "eight square inches" to someone, and we went down to the office desk to pay for the repair that had taken about twenty minutes. I had to fork out five shillings.

 

[Kukri]

I remember with affection most of the establishments mentioned, especially Wards at Pin Mill and Jack Holt at Heybridge, where we started cruising under the watchful eyes of George Clarke.

One place that is no longer with us is the old sail loft in Ipswich dock, whose name I've forgotten. They used to mainly make sails for barges. In our first year with our Cirrus I hoisted a radar reflector before crossing the dreaded Harwich harbour. Unfortunately, it caused a small tear in the jib. This was before yachtsmen carried sail-mending tape, so I was reduced to finding a sailmaker. Taking the sail and my 5-yr-old son on a train, I went into this august establishment with my pathetic bit of cloth. The man at the desk sneered at it and said that the sailmaker was away but that I might like to ask his deputy. We went up about four flights of stairs to the loft the size of a rugby pitch, where three gnomes sat around making grommetty things, and I went to the sailmaker. He also sneered at my cloth but agreed to patch it. He stitched a rectangle of cloth over the tear, cut out a smaller rectangle, and sewed the seam neatly. He said something like "eight square inches" to someone, and we went down to the office desk to pay for the repair that had taken about twenty minutes. I had to fork out five shillings.

Whitmore’s

 

[penfold]

I'm reminded of Fyfe & McGrouther's trade counter on Kennedy Street as I first encountered it 25 years ago; badly lit, dusty, a broad hardwood counter with an inlaid brass measure so worn it was barely legible. Shelves ran off into the gloom beyond sight. The denizens behind it wore brown dustcoats and made the Sphinx seem ebullient, fasteners were dispensed by weight, small quantities in a paper poke or a cardboard box if you were a big spender, hieroglyphics inscribed on the poke telling the chief sphinx what you owed.

 

[johnalison]

There was a chandlers in Dover I visited some years ago, as usual I forget the name. I wanted some lamp wick, and having failed to get any at the smart new chandlers a few doors away I tried my luck. The old boy in a brown dustcoat, who I have been told died a year or two later, got a stepladder and ascended to an extremely high shelf and brought down a large box, in which there was a large section of wicks of all sizes, from which I chose a foot or two of the right size for not many p. I think the old boy's son carried on the business for a while.

 

[Poecheng]

And I play you Thomas Foulkes in Leytonstone and Kelvin Hughes in the Minories

 

[Kukri]

And I play you Thomas Foulkes in Leytonstone and Kelvin Hughes in the Minories

JD Potter in the Minories! Gets a check in “The Riddle of the Sands”, published Claud Worth’s “Yacht Cruising”. Does anyone else remember the upstairs room which contained examples, displayed for sale, of every sextant then made?



And then there were these people, by Fenchurch Street station…

 

[LONG_KEELER]

Fifty years ago there were boatbuilders and chandlers everywhere. They have nearly all gone.

I remember buying two sets of Musto Ocean oilskins (very different to today’s) at a chandlery in Orford, and spares for a Baby Blake at Whisstocks chandlery in Woodbridge, in 1984. West Mersea had three boatbuilders - Wyatts, Clarke & Carter and Ben JG Clarke - in 1970.

I suppose it was the replacement of wood by plastic and the consequent drying up of repair business that did for the small boatbuilders. The London chandlers creamed off business from the coastal chandlers and were in turn wiped out by the Internet.

This has come to pass in my sailing lifetime.

A slight aside.

It was a short stage in the evolution, but I feel that plywood had rather a bad press. It bridged the gap between grp. The TV age with the likes of Barry Bucknell gave people the confidence to have a go at DIY projects including making your own boat.
Many were successful, and good old plywood probably launched the boom in sailing. Some fine Griffith's examples are still about but the number is falling.

Just wondering if all yards would build you a plywood hulled cruiser at the time.

 

[Kukri]

Pretty much, yes. Or clinker, like the Kestrels.

 

[PeterWright]

Hi Kukri,

The mention of Whitmore's brings back memories from my schooldays, not only of the wonderful sail loft, who supplied covers for boats built at my grandfather's Cullingham Road boatyard, but also of the delightful daughter of the Whitmore family.

A bit more than 50 years ago but those were the days!

Peter.

 

[SP2]

JD Potter in the Minories! Gets a check in “The Riddle of the Sands”, published Claud Worth’s “Yacht Cruising”. Does anyone else remember the upstairs room which contained examples, displayed for sale, of every sextant then made?

View attachment 122187View attachment 122188

And then there were these people, by Fenchurch Street station…

J D Potter! When I was an articled clerk, I would volunteer to travel up to London to be generally belittled by the staff in the High Court just so I could detour on the way back to Fenchurch Street for my Potter fix.

 

[slowboat]

Fifty years ago there were boatbuilders and chandlers everywhere. They have nearly all gone.

I remember buying two sets of Musto Ocean oilskins (very different to today’s) at a chandlery in Orford, and spares for a Baby Blake at Whisstocks chandlery in Woodbridge, in 1984. West Mersea had three boatbuilders - Wyatts, Clarke & Carter and Ben JG Clarke - in 1970.

I suppose it was the replacement of wood by plastic and the consequent drying up of repair business that did for the small boatbuilders. The London chandlers creamed off business from the coastal chandlers and were in turn wiped out by the Internet.

This has come to pass in my sailing lifetime.

Fifty years ago there were boatbuilders and chandlers everywhere. They have nearly all gone.

I remember buying two sets of Musto Ocean oilskins (very different to today’s) at a chandlery in Orford, and spares for a Baby Blake at Whisstocks chandlery in Woodbridge, in 1984. West Mersea had three boatbuilders - Wyatts, Clarke & Carter and Ben JG Clarke - in 1970.

I suppose it was the replacement of wood by plastic and the consequent drying up of repair business that did for the small boatbuilders. The London chandlers creamed off business from the coastal chandlers and were in turn wiped out by the Internet.

This has come to pass in my sailing lifetime.

Yup it’s changing, sadly the east coast is starting to get a bit south coast in a places now .

 

[Kukri]

J D Potter! When I was an articled clerk, I would volunteer to travel up to London to be generally belittled by the staff in the High Court just so I could detour on the way back to Fenchurch Street for my Potter fix.

I was more fortunate; I was articled to a “shipping firm” - the long vanished Constant and Constant- so I had a legitimate reason to call in to Potters, to buy sets of charts for use in Lloyd’s Form arbitrations. Also the High Court staff of the Wills Wives and Wrecks division were - apart from the Judge, the terrifying Sir Henry Brandon, avuncular, and helpful to beginners.

 

[Dan Tribe]

Remember all those cryptic notations in “East Coast Rivers” … HWFC 12.00, FW top of hard, EC Wed…”

Tony Ward’s Pin Mill emporium where you started outside with “Two gallons of Stuart Turner”, and I suspected that if you ever got right to the back of that Aladdin’s cave you would have found spares for your Rippingille No.3, wrapped in oiled paper.

Cook’s sailmakers at Maldon. North Fambridge Yacht Station. Arthur Holt at Heybridge..

Dixon Kerly in Maldon was another one. Smelled of parafin and Stockholm tar, and hemp rope.
I went to buy some asbestos string to wrap an exhaust pipe.
" 30 feet of 1/4 inch asbestos string please"
"Oh no, we've gone metric now"
" OK, 10 metres of 6mm string then"
He carefully measured it with a yardstick then coverted it to meters with a ready reckoner. Then loaded it onto some old fashioned scales.
" Why are you doing that?"
" Oh, it's sold by weight, 10 bob a pound"

 

[Biggles Wader]

There was a chandlers in Dover I visited some years ago, as usual I forget the name. I wanted some lamp wick, and having failed to get any at the smart new chandlers a few doors away I tried my luck. The old boy in a brown dustcoat, who I have been told died a year or two later, got a stepladder and ascended to an extremely high shelf and brought down a large box, in which there was a large section of wicks of all sizes, from which I chose a foot or two of the right size for not many p. I think the old boy's son carried on the business for a while.

Sharp and Enright. Still there

 

[Habebty]

Lovely reminiscing about old chandleries, Mine is Hardway Marine in the early 70s - I was about 10 by the way… when I used get a 2p tide table (or some equally paltry amount!) No flashy clothing, electronics or gizmos, just shackles, rope, fenders, Curry knives, and that smell you only get in old chandleries.