Bantham Sailing Club Helps Fight the Demise of Traditional Boat Building in the South West

11:50am Thursday 23rd July 2009

By Stephen Ivall

On the day that Bantham Sailing Club in South Devon, celebrates the opening of it’s new “finishing line” on the Avon Estuary it has also announced the creation of a new Annual Bursary supporting the “Traditional Boat Building Course” at Falmouth Marine School.

This one year course based around learning the specialist skills relevant to traditional boat building, restoration and repair will be specifically awarded annually to a student of Kingsbridge College and continues a tradition of their students going on to employment in Marine Engineering and sea related courses.

College Principal Roger Pope said: “This is a fantastic example of the way in which the local community supports students of the college. This is an innovative and imaginative way of helping students to learn the skills that carry the traditions of the past into the future. We are enormously grateful to all the members of the “Bantham Sailing Club” for making this possible.”

The “Traditional Boat Building Course” at Falmouth Marine School has a national reputation for the quality and relevance of the training and this award will assist keeping such crafts alive and well in the South Hams.

Falmouth Marine School Principal Tom Shaw said: “Over the past five years the costs of resourcing this specialist course have increased year on year and students have had to pay high fees to follow this training. Excellent news is that recent developments to the course have resulted in students under 19 years of age no longer having to pay fees. However there are still significant costs for all who have to live away from home. This would clearly be the case for anyone wishing to follow the course from Kingsbridge and South Devon. This Bursary will therefore help potential students from South Devon with the costs of living away from home”.

“Bantham Sailing Club” which was “re-floated” as an active club in 1975 mainly sails traditional clinker built wooden boats (Salcombe Yawls and Bantham Boats) around the beautiful Avon Estuary and has it’s base on the quay at Bantham where the new “Finishing Flagpole” has been erected along with a “Distance Mark” on the opposite bank.

Christened “The Hughie Line” it will be officially opened on Saturday August 1 at noon.

It is dedicated to the memory of Hugh Cater who was for many years Harbour Master at Bantham and was instrumental in the re-birth of the sailing club back in 1975. From this point on he and his wife Marilyn were very involved in every aspect of the club culminating in his being elected “Commodore” until his recent death.

The new Bursary was to a large degree inspired by Hughie’s phenomenal skills as a master boat builder and his legendary ability to sail around the estuary at twice the speed of anybody else!

Bantham Sailing Club has a long and honourable tradition for raising money for good local causes including some £100,000 in recent years which has supported the construction of the Surf Life Savers Centre on Bantham Beach and Thurlestone Village Hall amongst others.

Current Commodore Roger Smith said, “I hope the Club’s longer term charitable objectives will be a significant contribution to local young people and traditional boatbuilding in the South Hams, a contribution from those who love the area and a worthy memorial to the craft of Hugh Cater”.

The opening ceremony of the “Hughie Line” will take place on Bantham Quay at midday on Saturday August 1st and the line will be officially opened by Michael Toll Director of Evans Estates and lifelong friend of Hugh Cater.