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A Stunning Canal Photo


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On Tuesday 22nd May there is an auction of photograhs at the Bloomsbury Auction House.

 

Lot 96 is an utterly atmospheric canal shot from 1954 by the great English photojournalist Thurston Hopkins, now aged 98 - or 99.

 

Here is a link to the auction catalogue image: http://www.bloomsburyauctions.com/detail/35919/96.0

 

Does anyone recognise the boat?

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Does anyone recognise the boat?

I actually think I do.

 

If it is the one then I don't know what it was called then but when I helped rebuild the hull it was called Azuma and is one of Ken Keay's conversions.

 

Iirc it was named Catweazel, before Azuma.

 

I last saw it sunk at Wolfhampcote and I believe it has been broken up now.

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It looks like it was made out of the back end of a butty and kept the boatmans cabin.

I can still remember the bottle kilns from visiting my grandmother and aunt, all very different now.

About the time my parents started boating and Harecastle still had a tow path then and for quite a few years after.

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It looks like it was made out of the back end of a butty and kept the boatmans cabin.

Yes it was.

 

If it is Azuma we took the rotten remains of the back cabin off and, by that time, the original frames were totally shot too so we built a bulkhead and a front deck.

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Is this not one of the Canal Cruising Co early hire boats? they had a butty cut into two and if my memory serves me correct Barlows did the conversion work. Seem a bit early for a Keay conversion.

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Is this not one of the Canal Cruising Co early hire boats? they had a butty cut into two and if my memory serves me correct Barlows did the conversion work. Seem a bit early for a Keay conversion.

Perhaps.

 

I just took the word of the owner that Ken Keay did the conversion (he probably gets credited with a lot that aren't his).

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Perhaps.

 

I just took the word of the owner that Ken Keay did the conversion (he probably gets credited with a lot that aren't his).

Keays did convert the stern of a FMC wooden butty, however it had a proper conversion cabin with bus windows, it was owned by a Walsall family but the name eludes me.

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  • 2 weeks later...

There's another interesting boating picture amongst that collection - item No.46 on page three of the listing: A family shot on a Peniche or similar C1956 by Henri Cartier-Bresson http://www.bloomsburyauctions.com/detail/35919/46.0

£5000 for a shed?

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£5000 for a shed?

 

Only the picture of a shed. Though it does have some big bits, and a hull attached . . . and seemingly reproductive qualities.

 

Now, if the photo had been taken by me - what price then?

Edited by Derek R.
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Here is a link to the auction catalogue image: http://www.bloomsburyauctions.com/detail/35919/96.0

 

Does anyone recognise the boat?

I have left this thread alone in order to give somebody / anybody else a chance to identify this boat - alas........

 

I can identify this boat as the stern end of DANUBE. DANUBE was completed in April 1912 by William Nurser and Sons, Braunston for the Salt Union Ltd., Marston. After a full carrying career with several owners it was sold in 1950 to the owner of the Pallisey China Company, Longton for conversion to a pleasure boat, and was allegedly 'garaged' in Leek Tunnel. My records of DANUBE end in the 1970's, and I do not know whether the original fore end was used as another conversion.

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As to the location, Pottery kilns lined both the main line of the Trent & Mersey and the Caldon in the Potteries, but Longport and Middleport are possibilities considering the alignment of the towpath

 

Ray Shill

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Also pictured in this painting by William Cartledge, now in the Stoke museums collection.004664.jpg

This was featured in the Hidden Paintings series on the BBC last year. The white areas by the canal are potters' materials, china clay, flint etc and not snow as Nick Hancock, the presenter, thought. As a local lad, he should have known better!

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  • 4 weeks later...

Just to let you know, the photo fetched £700.

 

And the one by Cartier-Bresson (my all time favourite photographer) remains un-sold, I should have had a punt.

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