Category: History

The nobby Helen II is being restored at Conwy Harbour

Helen II in her heyday

The nobby, Helen II, is now being restored by craftsmen, volunteers and students at Conwy Harbour in North Wales – see the website here – as part of a project to redevelop the harbour area and to reinforce its connection with the past.

Nobbies are prawners, and Helen II was built in 1910 for the Mersey trade. Strong, seaworthy and fast, they boats have low freeboard and an elegant rounded stern, not for appearance’s sake but to ease the handling of trawl nets. On retiring from fishing some nobbies were converted to become yachts.

My thanks to intheboatshed.net reader Michael Bolton for pointing this one out!

Early 20th century Alfred Mylne yacht Belle Poule arrives at Stirling and Son

Early 20th century Alfred Mylne yacht Belle Poule arrives at Stirling and Son

Early 20th century Alfred Mylne yacht Belle Poule arrives at Stirling and Son

The 46ft Alfred Mylne-designed sailing yacht Belle Poule built shortly after the First World War has arrived at the Stirling and Son yard for restoration and repair.

Will Stirling reports that she has all the classic features of a fine Mylne yacht; her plans have been identified among the original A Mylne & Co archive collection.

Her current owner has had her shipped back from the USA, where she was saved by the Gannon and Benjamin boatyard, and stored at their premises at Martha’s Vineyard.

She is now due for an extensive rebuild, which will include centreline, some framing and some planking. The restoration will commence in the spring of 2012.

Stirling and Son carries out traditional yacht building and wooden boat repair and is based at Tavistock, Devon. Web: www.stirlingandson.co.uk, tel 01822 614259.

For many more posts featuring Stirling & Son, click here.

 

Century-old photos of Russian boats

Russian photos from a century ago, including boats Russian photos from a century ago, including boats

Russian photos from a century ago, including boats Russian photos from a century ago, including boats

These century-old colour photographs from Russia are held in the Prokudin-Gorskii Collection at the US Library of Congress.

It includes quite a number of shots including boats of various kinds: try these links to the collection using the search ‘boats’ and ‘sailor’.

To my mind, there’s something very still and a little eerie about these shots – still because of the photographic technology involved, and eerie because most of us really don’t expect photos of this age to be anything but black and white. The colour seems to give them a memory-like quality, yet they’re utterly strange to most of us.

What I think is also striking about these photos is how long, lean and slippery all the hulls are. It’s a powerful reminder of how much the internal combustion engine has changed the craft we use.

My thanks to John Adams and David Luckhardt for tipping me off about this collection.