FOLKBOATS UK - How It All Started
I
was kindly invited to submit a small
article about my business working with
the Folkboat, which all started some forty
five years ago, when I left school at the
tender age of sixteen to embark on my
journey into the marine industry and start
a four year apprenticeship. I had, at long
last, fallen on my feet and it gave me the
freedom of building real wooden boats.
Timber is such a wonderful material and
each boat has its own heart. In my first
year, I worked at the training centre in
Woolston Southampton and, as part of a
team of lads, worked on a Carvel Folkboat
which was later named “Smokey”. This
was due to a fire, which destroyed most
of the training centre but luckily this
boat, although damaged, was able to
be salvaged. The Folkboat was a good
choice to teach the young apprentices the
skills required to become a shipwright as
this boat represents everything required
to build a yacht no matter what size it is.
It took me another three years working
at a boatyard in Portsmouth to qualify
as a bona fida shipwright and I left with
distinctions, which I was so proud of.
After returning to Southampton College
for two years to gain business skills, I was
ready for the real world and I realised that
my education had only just begun. There
was no one to look over my shoulder and
advise me now!
I moved around various boat yards in
the south, working on different projects,
including a short spell on Velsheda, which
at that time, had just been purchased for
one pound (£1). After sitting on a mud
berth on Southampton Water for many
years. The army had used Velsheda
as a training exercise to recover large
objects out of the water onto Calshot Spit,
Southampton.
She dominated the sky line for some time
but I will always remember the day I set
foot on this iconic vessel. The ladder
from her transom seemed to reach to
the sky and on climbing the steps with
my tools, the sight before me has stayed
with me right through till today. She was
a very rusty hulk there was no deck, just
some of the deck beams and her empty
hull stretching before me, some 130 feet
of ribs. I always thought that it must have
been just as Jonah had experienced, as
he was swallowed up by the whale in the
Bible story.
Velsheda proved to be too much of a
challenge for such a small team and
later was sold on and today graces the
sea with her sheer elegance and is worth
millions.
42
Tony sailing 'Sky'
