| The History of Tudor Sailing Club by Kay Girard |
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Introduction |
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I have been a member of Tudor Sailing Club for about 26 years and 10 years ago, it being 1999 and the Club’s 50 th Anniversary, I wrote a potted history of the Club to enable new members to appreciate how it had been formed. Now 10 years on it seems appropriate to bring it up to date in this its 60 th year.
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| The intention is for all new members to be given information, including this, on a CD to refer to as and when they wish thus dispensing with paper versions. |
| A big thank you to all those members who supplied photographs, magazines and anecdotes to the original document and this update. |
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| In the beginning…
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| Tudor Sailing Club began as a breakaway, splinter group of the Portsbridge Cruising Club. Six members wanted to participate in dinghy racing and were unable to persuade the Club to promote this. As a result they met in a private garage in Chatsworth Avenue and set about constructing Cadet dinghies which were designed for construction by amateur enthusiasts with little skill and little money. At the time there were six hundred boats being made throughout the country and they were being promoted through the magazine ‘Yachting World’. The Second World War was over but there was still some rationing bringing austerity and drabness. A sail on the water seemed a touch of luxury reawakening dreams long forgotten. |
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Building the Cadets in the |
garages in 1948 |
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| Bits of wood, including pieces washed up by the sea, were used but still more was needed. It was necessary to apply to the Admiralty Regional Officer for a permit to buy sheets of marine plywood. A waterproof glue called Aerolite which had been used in the construction of the wooden Mosquito fighter-bomber aircraft of World War 2 fame, was used to stick the parts together. Scrap brazed with a blowlamp and using a few bricks to form a furnace made copper and brass fittings for rudders, chain plates, etc. Lucas and Company supplied the sails and a suitable mast could be made from two ex-Admiralty oars which were made from spruce. These were purchased from an ex-government surplus store and they were joined by a long scarf joint stuck together with glue. |
| On 19 th January 1949 the Club became officially founded with General Rules being accepted. The entrance fee for sailing and social members was levied at two shillings and sixpence (twelve and a half new pence) per annum and sixpence (two and a half pence) a week extra for boat owners. Three pence per week of the boat owners’ money was to go towards maintenance. The eventual aim was to have a Club house and storage space in the vicinity of Ports Creek. At this point in time the Club was in the embarrassing situation of being a sailing Club without any boats! Rumour was rife about a ‘fleet taking to the water’ but the first two dinghies weren’t launched until 13 th March 1949. By the end of April there were ten registered boats but only two afloat. |
| Initially a fleet of four Cadet dinghies was constructed and these were raced in Ports Creek. As reported earlier models were built mainly from scrap but by all accounts they sailed well and some are possibly still around today (they certainly were in 1999). The boats were launched from Tudor Crescent, when the tide obliged, and the Club became known as the Tudor Sailing Club. Club members pooled experience and tools and found what timber they could to add boats to the fleet. The following year another ten boats were built. Naturally even in those days a watering hole was sought – the Tudor Drill Hall in Tudor Crescent. |
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Launching a boat in the ‘early days’ |
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| New members were attracted by the sailing display each week and joined the Club in droves. A maintenance party made sure the boats were kept in trim. The aim of the Club was to train members in seamanship and to promote interest in sailing and racing. One of the many who watched the first few Cadets sailing in the creek was Mr Harry Brickwood, boss of the brewery, and a keen yachtsman. He saw the advantage of teaching children to sail in the safe waters of the creek and gave encouragement to the enterprise by presenting the Brickwood trophy for competition amongst Clubs with Cadet fleets. |
| A social committee was formed in the first year of the formation of the Club with the first function being a whist drive followed by a trip to Hayling Island. Tudor then made the national magazine ‘Yachting World’ when an article describing the Club and a photograph of a member’s Cadet appeared. The city regatta was held in the summer with Tudor Sailing Club taking third and fourth places followed by Portchester Sailing Club’s regatta where second, third and fifth places were achieved. Tudor’s first regatta attracted an entry of forty eight craft. |
| In September 1949 a report was published in the Evening News about the Club activities and this stimulated further interest and increased membership. The first official Annual General Meeting was held in October 1949. The motto ‘Unum consilium, unum ambitio, una propositum’ or ‘one design, one ambition, one purpose’ was adopted. The highlight of the year in 1949 must have been the first Annual Dinner and Dance which was held at the Drayton Institute on 20 th December 1949 where a toast was made to the King. |
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| A growing Club… |
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| It became obvious in time that more extensive sailing waters were required for the improving Club sailors. Near Eastern Road bridge was an old rifle range blessed with a large ‘hump’ which proved a splendid grandstand and site for a flagstaff. One could look out across to Farlington Marshes and there was not a mooring in sight. It was ideal for dinghy racing. The Sailing Club’s aim was to keep it that way and it wanted to keep it that way and wanted to ban all moorings in ‘their waters’. A full racing programme was planned from April until the end of September. |
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The Nissan hut |
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The land for the first Club building was leased from Portsmouth City Council on a short term lease because Hampshire County Council had ideas of widening the Eastern Road. Members at that time regarded their little hump as idyllic. It was pure luxury when facilities became available in the form of an ex-service Nissan hut. A cup of tea could be brewed on a primus stove after the day’s racing had finished but only if someone had remembered to transport the water from home! During the winter the hut was available for fitting out of boats under cover. |
| Following the success of the Cadet fleet a new senior class one was adopted – the Fleetwind. The Fleetwind designer had donated a jig so that every hull would be a strict one-design. The Fleetwind was stable, had a good performance and had modern refinements like a revolving mast and mast-jack. The cost was approximately £40 complete. |
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Fleetwinds by the Club in the early 1950s |
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By 1951 there were 117 members and the Club had a full racing programme from April through to the end of September. There were 25 – 35 dinghies in the compound and 5 or 6 boats on moorings. The compound had started life as a deep ditch but this had been filled in and in a few years it had to be extended twice to accommodate the expansion of the Club. In addition two slipways were constructed by members to ease launching. Apart from Cadets which were usually sailed by adults with a child crew, there were Fleetwinds, Hornets and Enterprises. The ‘one design’ limitation had already disappeared. |
| Planning permission had been granted for the Nissan hut but no plans had to be submitted as it was assumed that everyone knew what a Nissan hut looked like. However it was soon outgrown and the cost of a new Clubhouse seemed prohibitive. As always the members pulled together to raise money. Programmes priced at 3d (just over 1p today) were sold for the first regatta in August 1951 and after three years in 1954 a weekly soccer results competition had raised enough money to build a new headquarters. |
| Waters were much more extensive around the old Club site than they are today. This was because major road works in the Portsbridge area had not yet started. The Club was going from strength to strength and all was going well until the idea of a bar in the new Clubhouse was raised. There was a certain amount of opposition from those who did not want the Tudor Sailing Club turned into a drinking Club but after vociferous argument the drinkers won. Gradually space was taken away from fitting out space in favour of the bar. Fitting out was eventually banished in favour of more social activities.
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Building the second clubhouse |
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The ‘new’ Clubhouse of the early 1960s |
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| In 1958 planning permission was sought and agreed for a timber construction with windows and shutters added to the original building. A temporary portaloo was added for the ladies who, according to a past Commodore, they invariably managed to ‘bung’ up clogging the pumping system. The Flag Officers had the dubious pleasure of unbunging them and transferring the contents into large bins to await the arrival of the Cleansing Department….unless of course the tide was in when they would trip clumsily and tip the lot over the sea wall! The men had the luxury of Elsons!
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| During these early years Tudor Sailing Club renewed its lease every five years. It was unable to secure any degree of lengthy tenure of the site, but then in 1972 worse was to come – the lease was required to be renewed annually.
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The years of discussion and negotiation… |
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| In the 70s and 80s there were many discussions regarding the growing needs of the Club and its location. Portsmouth Corporation supported the idea of TSC moving near the School’s Sailing Centre because the Club buildings were an eyesore particularly where the toilet storage tanks were rusting through. The School’s Sailing Centre and Eastern Road were then the responsibility of Hampshire County Council who were far more cautious and wary of any implications it may have on the School’s Centre. |
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damage after 1987 storm |
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| In 1970 TSC reported to the Portsmouth Planning Committee that they wanted an extension to the lease and to have some improvements made. A proposal was submitted for a new building to go at right angles to the original but this was refused because of the planned widening of the road, which at the very latest was going to happen by 1980. |
| During the years 1966 – 1978 at least 30 letters were exchanged and
meetings took place between Club officials and Portsmouth City Council
officials to come up with a site which satisfied both. TSC’s preferred
location was just south of Kendalls Quay. Club officials were concerned
that they may be persuaded to take a site north of Kendalls which would
have poor access to the water. A compromise might be to have a Clubhouse
there and the boat compound by the slip south of Kendalls.
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| To cut a long and tedious story short, where hopes were raised and
dashed, meetings with Hampshire County Council began in earnest and
after four years of negotiation TSC accepted that if the shell of the
building could be built on the land south of Kendalls then the
membership would do the rest. On handover day in 1991 many were shocked
at the enormity of what was being taken on. As a Club Tudor members had
just recovered from the devastation of the 1987 storm with over 100mph
winds and the repair or replacement of many boats had taken place.
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