Edith May Year video; screen-grab from Ed Gransden’s Facebook time line, grabbed by Matt Care
Edith May’s Ed Gransden has posted a nice video on Facebook reviewing their year. It’s in 2 parts, the first being http://www.facebook.com/ed.gransden?fref=ts . I will publish details on Part 2 when I have them. I think I’m right in saying these are within FB rather than being available on You Tube as a whole (is that right, Ed?) so you may need to be a registered FB user to get at them. They are very good – short video clips inter-leaved with ‘slide-show’ stills taking you through what has been a very good year for them. Not only were they nominated as National Register of Historic Ships flag-ship, but they have also had a host of different bands playing aboard and there is stuff too from some fine dining events and even a crab-winch winding competition. It’s well worth a look.
Meanwhile I had a nice barge-y coincidence happen to me just pre Christmas. Buying this house in Ireland, we were excited to learn that the seller had Whitstable connections, having lived in Kent for a while and her partner having family there. We went through all the house-move trying to keep on friendly terms with the vendor and have since become quite good friends. The couple have actually been here visiting a few times to see what we’ve done to bring their family’s derelict farmhouse back to life. Just pre Christmas they dropped by en route to Knock airport (which is only 20 minutes away) and the partner, Paul, noticing my barge pictures, commented that I might know his 2nd cousin, none other than Roger Newlyn!
Once they’d departed, I emailed Roger just to tell him of this and was delighted to receive back the following detail. “Paul’s Dad, Don”, said Roger, “was a shipwright and cabinet maker working for Anderson Rigden & Perkins in Whitstable. A perfectionist. If it wasn’t right, he smashed it up. He built several boats of which I had one. It was an over-sized Mirror. If I didn’t have it the hammer would have come down on it. He improved the handling by making it that little bigger. Always after perfection. He is coming up to being 91 and still rides his pushbike down into town”
Small world, indeed.