Pleasure Boating on the Thames E-Book

Simon Wenham

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 519

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

The River Thames above London underwent a dramatic transformation during the Victorian period, from a great commercial highway into a vast conduit of pleasure. Pleasure Boating on the Thames traces these changes through the history of the firm that did more than any other on the waterway to popularise recreational boating. Salter Bros began as a small boat-building enterprise in Oxford and went on to gain worldwide fame, not only as the leading racing boat constructor, but also as one of the largest rental craft and passenger boat operators in the country. Simon Wenham's illustrated history sheds light on over 150 years of social change, how leisure developed on the waterway (including the rise of camping), as well as how a family firm coped with the changes brought about by industrialisation – a business that, today, still carries thousands of passengers a year.

Leseprobe

Contents

Title Page

Acknowledgements

Author’s Note

Introduction

1 The Sport of Rowing

2 Boat-Building

3 Thames Pleasure Boating

4 Thames Passenger Services

5 Property

6 The Workforce

7 The Family

In Conclusion

Appendix

Copyright

Acknowledgements

Firstly, I would like to thank Amy Rigg, Rebecca Newton and the team at The History Press for all their hard work in publishing the book, and the directors of Salters’, John Salter and Neil Kinch, for permission to access the company archive, without which the study could not have gone ahead. Secondly, I am especially grateful to Mark Smith and Christopher Day of Kellogg College, Oxford, for supervising my doctoral research and for all their invaluable advice, and to Clare Wenham for her tireless proofreading. I would also like to thank Michael Ramsden, Ian Smith, Amy Orr-Ewing and John Lennox for allowing me the flexibility at work to be able to conduct the research.

There are a large number of people who have provided guidance or information for the work. I am particularly grateful to Bill Dunckley, for filling in many gaps in my understanding, and Sidney Aster, for sending a number of interesting pieces from his related study. Others who have been very helpful include Robert Sackett, Margaret Clutterbuck, Bryan Dunckley, John Greenford, Graham Andrews, Peter Bowley, Steve Gaisford, Len Andrews, Ray Underwood, Steve Long, Albert Andrews, Merlyn Coates, David Nutt, Peter Robinson, Bob Dowthwaite, Gordon Smith, Paul Richmond and George Wyatt. I am also grateful to the Hobbs (Tony and Jonathan) and Turk (Mike and Richard) families for providing comparative information about their own family businesses on the Thames.

I would like to thank the many experts who have provided information or advice, including Iain MacLeod, Jeremy Burchardt, Liz Woolley, Tony Langford, Brian Hillsdon, John Foreman, Hugh McKnight, Roy Brinton, Rosemary Stewart-Beardsley, Janet Hurst, Frank Tallet, Laura Wortley, Dominic Erdozain, Mike Hurst, Martin Wellings, Peter Forsaith, Mark Davies, David Wenham, Emma Webster and Detlef Hempel. Those from the rowing community who have helped include Ian Smith, John Blackford, Eugene Crotty, Bryan Humphries, Theo Brun and Henry Myatt. Furthermore, Alan Birch provided information about sailing in the Midlands.

I would like to express my gratitude to those working in the many archives I have used, especially those at the Bodleian Library and the Berkshire Record Office. Those who have helped in the many other locations include Yvonne Taylor, Eloise Morton, Hettie Ward, Rosemary Joy, Chris Jeens, Amanda Ingram, Judith Curthoys, Emma Walsh, Julian Lock, Oliver Mahony, Robert Petre, Emma Goodrum, Emily Burgoyne, Cliff Davies, Alma Jenner, Rory Cook, Penny Hatfield, Clare Sargent and Claire Franklin. I am also grateful to Jim Cowan for permission to view his archive on the firm.

I would like to thank David Bowman for helping decipher the financial records, and Ian Farrell, Peter Southwell and Richard Carwardine for encouraging my work. I am also grateful for the contributions from those I have met at my speaking engagements, as well as those who have contacted the firm with historical information.

Finally, and most importantly, I must thank my wife, Angela (and son, Benjamin), for providing love, support and encouragement – and for putting up with me (and notes) cluttering up the house.

Author’s Note

This book examines the history of Salter Bros Ltd and the firms connected with it, in order to show: firstly, how they fitted within the socio-economic context of Oxford and the Thames; secondly, the contribution they made to different forms of water-based leisure; and thirdly, how they evolved and ultimately managed to survive, bearing in mind the challenges such businesses faced. It takes a thematic approach, which involves examining the five main areas of the firm’s commercial activities, which were: providing services for the sport of rowing (chapter 1), boat-building (chapter 2), boat-letting (chapter 3), passenger boat operating (chapter 4) and property development (chapter 5). The mainly quantitative data from the archive have been supplemented and put into context by drawing on wider qualitative sources, although there is not always much comparative information available. Finally, we examine the way in which the workforce evolved, which shows how Salters’ managed to survive the impact of the industrialisation of Oxford (chapter 6), and the effects of being run by a single family over generations (chapter 7).

Sources

The main source used for researching this book is the extensive company archive, which contains the largest collection of documents relating to the firm. This resource survived partly because of the extent of property that Salters’ came to own around Folly Bridge (see chapter 5), which ensured there was plenty of space in which records could be stored long term. Yet the majority of the documents date from the end of the nineteenth century onwards, which means there is little information about the firm’s first three decades. Furthermore, the only comprehensive end of year accounts to survive date from 1915 (when Salters’ became a limited company) to 1949. There are no records that show the firm’s overall financial performance between 1950 and 1964, and the abbreviated accounts that were filed thereafter only show a summary, rather than how each individual department was faring.

The largely quantitative sources from the company archive have been supplemented by interviews conducted with past and present staff members, whose collective memories stretch back to the 1930s.1 The Salter family also produced some written accounts, and a number of them were featured on local radio shows.2 There is also a considerable collection of documents relating to the firm’s history in private ownership.3 Furthermore, the author has also been able to draw from his own knowledge of the firm and the river, having been a seasonal employee at Salters’ from 1998 to 2000 and a full-time manager thereafter until 2005.

In terms of the wider primary source material, one of the most useful is what became known as The Salter’s Guide to the Thames, of which there were fifty-seven editions published between 1881 and 1968. Other helpful resources include the annual Rowing Almanack (published from 1861), the Lock to Lock Times (from 1888) and The Motor Boat (from 1904). The archives of the Thames Conservancy (at the Berkshire Record Office) and the Oxford University colleges also provide invaluable information. Local newspapers help to shed light on many of the activities of Salters’, and the British Library’s electronic collection of these (and periodicals) from the nineteenth century is a particularly rich resource. The latter is one of a new generation of online facilities that have greatly aided historical research.

Finally, in writing this history of Salters’, we have of course had to be sensitive to the fact that the firm continues to operate today. It has not been possible, therefore, to go into great detail about all the family dynamics at the business, for example, even though such relationships inevitably shaped how Salters’ was run.

Notes

1 Those interviewed include Len Andrews (who began working at the firm in 1930), Albert Andrews (1936), Bill Dunckley (1944), Bryan Dunckley (1947), John Greenford (1955), Peter Bowley (1956) and Steve Gaisford (1970).

2 A. Salter, Memoirs of a Public Servant (London, 1961) and memoirs in the possession of the Sackett family. Centre for Oxfordshire Studies (COS) Radio interviews with Edward Arnold Salter (1931), reference: OXOHA: MT 1411, and Arthur Salter (1971), reference: OXOHA: MT 536.

3 Archive compiled by an unnamed employee in 1976, now in the possession of Jim Cowan.

Introduction

I have seen the Mississippi. That is muddy water. I have seen the St Lawrence. That is crystal water. But the Thames is liquid history.

John Burns MP, 19431

Oxford owes not only its name but also its very existence to its waterways. It is by the banks of the river Thames at Folly Bridge, where the original ford may have been, that one of the city’s oldest family firms continues to operate.

Founded in 1858 by the brothers John and Stephen Salter, the business – later known as Salter Bros Ltd (or Salters’ for short)2 – became one of the most important firms connected with the recent history of the Upper Thames,3 substantially responsible for popularising pleasure boating on the waterway between Oxford and London. As well as becoming one of the largest boat-letters in the country, it became the major passenger boat operator on the non-tidal river, carrying hundreds of thousands of customers per year. Moreover, it developed into one of the foremost inland boat-builders in England, with its craft used widely around the country and its racing boats briefly enjoying worldwide fame. The firm also made a significant impact on the lives of many in Oxford, not only by providing leisure facilities, but as one of the larger non-university employers. Furthermore, the family would boast two mayors of the city, a Member of Parliament (and life peer) and a Waterman to the queen.

The business managed to survive in an era of immense change in the city. When the firm began, Oxford was still largely pre-industrial in character with the major source of both direct and indirect employment being the university, whose demands fluctuated with the academic terms. The city was said to be in ‘great need’ of major industry,4 with levels of pay that were ‘about the lowest in England’ in 1908, owing to a surplus of labour and low agricultural wages in the surrounding countryside.5 The city’s ‘air of almost studied backwardness’6 lasted until the early part of the twentieth century when William Morris, who had previously had a cycle repair shop, started manufacturing cars. After Morris relocated his works to Cowley on the eastern outskirts of the city in 1912, his firm became the country’s largest producer of automobiles between 1925 and 1939.7 It was the expansion of the motor industry that made Oxford one of the fastest-growing cities in the inter-war period (Table 1). Its population doubled between 1911 and 1941 and the east side of Oxford was transformed into what John Betjeman described as ‘Motopolis’.8

Table 1 Oxford’s population9

Year

County borough population

Change

1901

49,336

+3,594 (7.9%)

1911

53,048

+3,712 (7.5%)

1921

57,036

+3,988 (7.5%)

1931

80,539

(boundary extended in 1929)

+23,503 (41.2%)

1941

107,000

(estimated from the 1951 census)

+26,461 (32.9%)

1951

98,684

(taken when university on vacation)

−8,316 (8.4%)

1961

106,291

(boundary extended in 1957)

+7,607 (7.7%)

1971

108,805

+2,514 (2.4%)

As one study has pointed out, ‘it is difficult to exaggerate the impact that the interwar growth of the car industry had on the city of Oxford and its surrounding areas’.10 The job market was transformed: by 1936 over 10,000 people were employed in the city’s motor industry, which was approximately 30 per cent of the insured workers in the area.11 There was not enough local labour to meet the demand and staff had to be recruited from the West Midlands, South Wales and London. Whilst some local firms benefited from the changes that occurred, many employers suffered because they were unable to compete with the levels of pay offered in the car industry. Furthermore, the old-established hierarchy of jobs was overturned, as semi-skilled factory workers could earn significantly more than those in professions previously considered to be of higher status, such as college servants.12 The problem was particularly acute for the skilled trades, many of which relied upon lengthy periods of low-paid apprenticeship. Nevertheless, behind the long shadow cast by the motor works, a number of smaller firms survived and some, like Salters’, even outlived the Morris brand.

Oxford and the Thames

Despite Salters’ age, the firm’s history is still relatively unknown; a short work by this author in 2005 was the first to examine the business in any depth.13 A number of studies have been conducted on Oxford’s recent history, but many of these focus on the impact of industrialisation and make little or no mention of the boat business.14 Even the company’s 150th anniversary in 2008 went largely unnoticed, as the milestone was only marked by Limited Edition (an Oxford Times supplement), which ran a feature on the firm’s long-standing chief engineer, Bill Dunckley.15

A number of academic studies have examined the way in which waterway communities developed over the past two centuries. Mary Prior’s work focused on those living and working at Fisher Row in Oxford, for example, but it also showed how the arrival of the railway in the city, in 1844, provided the coup de grâce to the ailing barge trade based at Folly Bridge. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the canal system had declined to such an extent that many of those whose livelihoods had depended on the waterway had either left the area or diversified into other trades.16 Wendy Freer’s work showed, however, that although the proportion of the nation’s freight carried by the canals dropped drastically in the nineteenth century, and the industry ‘never really recovered’ from the Great Depression and the rise of motorised road transport in the inter-war period, some parts of the trade were still fulfilling a need beyond the Second World War. Her study also dispelled some of the stereotypes circulating about those working on the waterway, whilst also reaffirming that they were a marginalised, insular and distinctive occupational group.17

The transformation of the Thames from a working waterway into one primarily used for leisure is an area that has received relatively little attention from scholars – especially when compared to the amount of literature generated about the rise of seaside resorts – but there have been a number of studies showing how river communities adapted to these changes in the nineteenth century. David Blomfield’s work on the watermen and lightermen of the Upper Tidal Thames (Teddington to Chiswick) from 1750 to 1901, for example, shows that by the middle of the nineteenth century many of those working on the waterway had started to cater for the leisure market, often as small side-lines from their main occupation. Indeed, he argues that a family’s ability to remain on the river was strongly influenced by both their location and whether or not they were able to adapt their skills in response to the changing public demand.18 Rosemary Stewart-Beardsley’s study showed how five parishes located in the Goring Gap developed after the arrival of the railway in the 1830s, and included an examination of how the area changed as it became a popular tourist destination in the second half of the nineteenth century. New facilities emerged to cater for the growing leisure market, for example, and these included providing craft for pleasure boating, which she argues became a highly fashionable activity on the river in the 1880s.19

Whilst the academic literature on the recent history of the river is relatively sparse, a vast amount has been written at the popular level. The sheer range of topics is summed up in The Thames 1580–1980: A General Bibliography, which lists nineteen different categories, including engineered structures, natural history and craft on the waterway.20 There are many popular works referring to Salters’, from the more general, like Patricia Burstall’s The Golden Age of the Thames,21 to those with a narrower focus, like Frank Dix’s Royal River Highway: A History of the Passenger Boats and Services on the River Thames.22 Furthermore, there have been a number of short informal accounts written about the firm in specialist waterway magazines, although these do little to explain the company’s development in terms of the wider changes that were occurring at the time.23

This book fills an important gap in the history of the river, by showing how the development of Salters’ over the past two centuries fitted within, and contributed to, the socio-economic context of both the Thames and Oxford. In a sense it follows on from Mary Prior’s work, as it represents the next chapter in the river’s history, after the railway had destroyed the barge trade operating from Folly Bridge. This book, based on a doctoral thesis, is the first comprehensive work on any of the major historic firms operating on the Upper Thames.24 Some of the other well-known river businesses, like Turks of Kingston (which traces its existence back to 1710), and Hobbs of Henley (founded in 1870), do not have the same level of archival material, meaning that only short informal histories have been produced.25 The closest firms to Salters’ that have had popular works written about them are the shipbuilders of John I. Thornycroft of Chiswick (founded in 1864)26 and Sam Saunders of Streatley (1870).27 Drawing comparisons from these may seem inappropriate, but the larger businesses grew from smaller enterprises, and they not only faced the same kind of operational challenges as boat-builders, but could also be in direct competition with each other when it came to the sale of smaller vessels.

In this book we also show how an Oxford business managed to survive in a city that was transformed by industrialisation in the inter-war period. This is a topic that few of the popular histories of other local businesses cover.28 Furthermore, it also sheds light on a distinctive waterway community, which, unlike those on the canal, has received little attention from scholars.

Leisure

An important topic which we will throw new light on is that of leisure, as this was the market on which Salters’ was primarily focused. Sport and leisure are subjects in which ‘an undeniably vigorous and extensive historiography’ has emerged over the past three decades from a range of disciplines.29 These have tended to be either ‘social history with the sport left out, or sports history with the politics, society and economy left out’.30 The approach favoured by many leisure historians has been to show how particular pastimes were created or moulded by political, economic, demographic, intellectual and other forces, which provides a useful ‘window’ through which the developments of other areas of society can viewed. Yet sociological studies have also helped to emphasise the social, psychological and cultural value of sport and leisure. They not only have a major influence on people’s health and quality of life; they can also be one of the ways in which the participants derive meaning and purpose in life.31

This book is not intended to contribute directly to discussion of the conceptualisation of leisure by historians or sociologists, but to the study of the processes known as the ‘commercialisation of leisure’.32 This topic, which Pamela Horn describes as ‘the most striking feature of the final years of the [nineteenth] century’,33 is one of two major themes that scholars examining popular pastimes have considered (the other being class conflict).34 Peter Bailey suggests that it was a ‘quickening of commercialisation’, combined with the ‘broadening impact of technology’, that drove the transformation of leisure and popular culture from the 1880s onwards.35 This led to the emergence of ‘new leisure industries’, which were ‘both functions of material conditions and creators of employment’.36 Competition between these could, at times, be fierce, although Stephen Jones suggests that it was not until the inter-war period that ‘entertainment and leisure became big business’.37

Peter Borsay points out that one of the problems with this area of study is that historians often buy into the ‘profoundly influential myth of progress’.38 Irrespective of which of the last three centuries is being studied, ‘the middle class are always said to be rising … [and] leisure is always said to be commercializing’.39 He argues, therefore, that a more helpful approach to understanding the topic is to identify the variations that occurred in both supply and demand.

The ‘demand-led view of economic change’ continues to hold sway with leisure historians. This involves contextualising activities within specific chronological periods, ‘each characterized by the absorption of a class or social group into the market place for leisure’.40 The majority of scholars argue that the period between the mid-nineteenth century and the First World War, for example, marked a new era in the development of leisure activities, although it is the last quarter of the nineteenth century that is often seen as ‘the most crucial stage in the general transformation’.41 During the latter there was not only a ‘scramble for sport’ amongst the middle classes,42 but it was also when the huge potential of the working classes as consumers of leisure was ‘first properly realised’ on a national scale, as a result of increasing spending power and greater amounts of free time.43

Salters’ was involved with the supply of leisure activities, which was an area in which technology, capital, entrepreneurship, professionalisation and the development of cartels all played a part. Technological developments helped to deliver certain forms of leisure – although some activities offered little scope for innovation – whilst improvements to the transport network and the communication of news also helped to popularise certain pastimes. Entrepreneurship also played a significant role. Yet although historians have tended to focus on the most influential individuals, like the pioneer of the tourist industry, Thomas Cook, it was the mass of small-scale entrepreneurs who were ‘far more important in promoting the commercialization of leisure’.44 As the leisure industry grew, this led to the professionalisation of some activities, although it is important to note that ‘certain aspects of leisure were at odds with or resistant to commercialization’.45 Borsay argues that in order to understand how pastimes developed over time, it is necessary to acknowledge that they could be affected by a large range of factors, including the health of the economy, the role of the state, class politics, self and collective identities, geographical location, distinctions between urban and rural communities, and the availability of free time. Indeed, he stresses that each particular type of recreation can experience its own internal life-cycle, ‘the rise and fall of which does not, of itself, reflect the fortunes of leisure as a whole’.46

In this book we will focus on three types of leisure activity on the Thames, the first of which is the sport of rowing. In The Social History of English Rowing, Neil Wigglesworth identifies Salters’ as one of the two dominant racing boat-builders of the mid-nineteenth century; so this work provides the opportunity to examine in more depth why this was the case.47 Indeed, it shows that the firm arguably had a greater impact on the sport than has been previously acknowledged.

A second area we will look at is the rise of pleasure boating on the Upper Thames. This remains a favourite topic for popular histories of the river, but it is one that has received little academic attention. Rosemary Stewart-Beardsley is one of the few scholars to examine the statistics behind the phenomenon,48 whilst Lisa Tickner’s article ‘Messing About in Boats: E.J. Gregory’s Boulter’s Lock: Sunday Afternoon (R.A. 1897)’ provides one of the best descriptions of how the Upper Thames changed in the late Victorian period.49 Alison Byerly’s work focuses on the literature that helped to shape perceptions of the waterway,50 whereas Wigglesworth describes many of the different types of recreational boating that took off around the country at this time, including some on the river.51 By examining one of main companies responsible for popularising pleasure boating on the Upper Thames, we will shed light on how different activities on the waterway developed, including the rise of camping as a recreational pastime.

A third type of leisure to be discussed is travelling by passenger boat. John Armstrong and David Williams argue that the steamboat, rather than the train, played a pioneering role in promoting recreational travel,52 as is shown by the millions of passengers who were transported from London to seaside resorts like Gravesend and Margate between 1815 and 1840.53 Yet the only detailed study of the non-tidal river is Frank Dix’s popular work on the history of passenger boat services on the waterway as a whole. By examining the largest and most successful operator on the Upper Thames, this book not only gives more precise information about one of the major firms mentioned by Dix, but it also highlights the significant differences between running on the higher and the lower reaches of the river.

Another significant aspect of this work is the way it traces the evolution of a major provider of services on the waterway over one of the most significant periods in the development of sport and leisure – the end of the nineteenth century. Moreover, it shows how a firm was able to survive in an industry that is ‘at the more volatile and risky end of the business spectrum’,54 because the leisure market is influenced so much by the ‘flights of fashion’.55

Business History

In examining the history of Salters’ we are contributing to the historical study of family firms. There has been a lot of discussion about such firms, and there is an on-going debate about whether they should be viewed as ‘a source of economic growth or as a harbinger of conservatism and stagnation’.56

In his influential English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit, Martin Wiener argued that business owners were ultimately responsible for the decline of the British economy from the end of the nineteenth century onwards, because their desire to become landed gentry caused them (and their descendants) to become distracted from the primary focus of production and profit.57 As David Landes explains, many industrialists ‘sold out’ to a role prescribed by the upper reaches of society, as ‘rather than wear the short sleeves of their forefathers, they finish in silks and velvets, and focus on politics, culture, or the unabashed pursuit of the good life’.58

Linked to this notion is the so-called ‘Buddenbrooks effect’ (named after Thomas Mann’s novel), which postulates that the important ingredients of entrepreneurial instinct plus a strident work ethic usually remain strong in those with a direct link to the founder, but that by the third generation this is often lost, as a result of family members being sent to select schools in order to enhance their social standing. This education provided neither the training nor the motivation to run a business and, instead, could nurture a desire to emulate the aristocratic lifestyle. Although some were able to sustain this transition, it could herald a family’s economic ruin, especially if the ‘effective direction of their businesses’ was left to managers who were practical, but not entrepreneurial.59 The Lancashire proverb ‘From clogs to clogs in three generations’ was not, therefore, without foundation, as Alfred Marshall explained:

When a man has got together a great business his descendants often fail in spite of their great advantages to develop the high abilities and special turn of mind and temperament required for carrying it on with equal success … When a full generation has passed, when the old traditions are no longer a safe guide and when the bonds that held together the old staff have been dissolved, then the business almost invariably falls to pieces.60

This dilution of ability is supported by T. Nicholas’ study of a number of successful British entrepreneurs since 1850. Although he concludes that further research is still needed in this area, he argues that the region of activity, type of occupation and religious affiliation were not determinants of entrepreneurial success, but that a ‘high-status education was associated with inferior performance’. Indeed, ‘firm inheritors performed less well than firm founders and managers’, with the third generation failing, in particular, when compared to their ‘arriviste counterparts’.61 One possible reason for this, according to Matthias Doepke and Fabrizio Zilibotti, is that:

Parents shape their children’s preferences in response to economic incentives. Middle-class families in occupations requiring effort, skill, and experience develop patience and a work ethic, whereas upper-class families relying on rental income cultivate a refined taste for leisure. These class-specific attitudes, which are rooted in the nature of preindustrial professions, become key determinants of success once industrialization transforms the economic landscape.62

Other classic weaknesses said to blight family firms are a lack of professional management skills, a failure to train successors adequately, a potential for in-fighting amongst relatives and an institutional conservatism that can cause both declining efficiency and a reluctance to embrace technological change.63

Yet, in spite of the potential vulnerabilities of such businesses, it would be wrong to view them as anachronistic oddities. Although few enjoy long-term success – in 1996, the Institute of Directors estimated that only around 24 per cent survive to the second generation and 14 per cent to the third64 – family firms still account for between 60 and 90 per cent of all businesses in the European Union (the figure varying from country to country), as well as providing approximately two-thirds of jobs and overall gross national product.65 Furthermore, the suggestion that the gentrification of business owners caused the country’s economic decline at the end of the nineteenth century has been discredited. F.M.L. Thompson points out that between 1870 and 1990 the overall picture was generally one of growth in the economy, in terms of both gross national product and income per capita. It was not until the 1960s, when the British economy began to be overtaken by Germany, France and Japan, that commentators started to look for the long-term causes of the inefficiencies that were apparent in certain industries. This led, paradoxically, to the finger of blame being pointed at both the ‘educated amateurs’ (businessmen from public schools and universities), who were supposedly distracted by the trappings of wealth, and the ‘practical men’ (those who did not have elite schooling or a university education), who were left to run businesses and supposedly lacked the necessary entrepreneurial talent.66 Yet Thompson points out that the former did not enter the business world in large numbers until after the Second World War. Moreover, it was entirely normal for those who had accumulated wealth to pursue different elements of a gentrified existence, like acquiring property in the country, sending children to elite schools and focusing more on leisure and the arts. Some purchased estates and withdrew from business, resulting in their families and descendants being assimilated into the landed aristocracy and gentry. Yet there were others, the so-called ‘aristocratic bourgeoisie’ (particularly those in banking, finance or brewing), for whom acquiring property ‘may well have reinvigorated the industrial spirit’, for it led to the founding of long-standing business dynasties. Thompson stresses that ‘at no point would it appear to have had any pronounced effects on the performance of the national economy or on the overall economic performance of the gentrified new men’, but that on balance it should be seen as ‘a derivative of individual achievement and aspiration more than a determinant of economic advance or decline’.67

Mary Rose suggests that the success or failure of a business often hinged on whether it was able to overcome certain organisational challenges, such as a company’s capability of moving with the times through investment in new technology, and the ‘critical test’ of succession, which she describes as one of the most crucial determinants ‘not only of a family firm’s future prosperity, but its very survival’.68 Although she acknowledges some of the inherent vulnerabilities of such businesses, she argues that the prevailing socio-economic conditions of the early part of the Industrial Revolution were particularly suited to them: ‘Small localised and often specialised markets, combined with the need for personal contact and trust in an age of unlimited liability, rendered the family firm a perfect organisational form.’69

As a result, ‘a high level of regional specialisation’ developed amongst nineteenth-century British businesses, although this started to erode as the expansion of the railway ushered in more of a national economy. Businesses sought to insulate themselves from the fragility of the economy by developing and operating ‘networks of trust’ within their geographical setting that reflected ‘far more than flows of finance’. These ensured that the stratification and structure of the company was ‘closely bound up with the culture and institution of the surrounding community’. Furthermore, shared religious convictions could help to influence business ethics and attitudes towards paternalism, as well as providing ‘a common set of values and endogenous behaviour, which tied together extended families … [and] could also provide the respectability crucial to business success’.70

Therefore, if potential hazards were managed well, family firms could benefit from a number of strengths. They tend to take a long-term view of business, they are often less bureaucratic, and the issue of succession can sometimes be less divisive, if the heir is already predetermined and if they bring with them a high level of specialist experience. Furthermore, those in charge can shape ‘the prevailing attitudes, norms and values in the company’, and this can produce greater productivity, if the workers feel part of the family and share in a common commitment, identity and purpose.71

Andrea Colli reminds us that research on this topic has broadened greatly over recent years and is now ‘multi-disciplinary, drawing upon sociology, politics, and management, just as much as on economics and history’. He notes that ‘There has been a growing tendency to analyse the role of the family firms at the different stages of growth of a defined national economy system’ and that the minority of businesses that survived often did so by changing into either managerial or public companies.72 Yet he also argues that ‘Significant study evidence in Western economies now shows that family firms may have a positive influence in some sectors, especially in services, as compared with publicly owned and managerial companies in other spheres’.73

This is an interesting observation, as when it comes to focusing on boat businesses on the Upper Thames, it was family firms that enjoyed the greatest success. Indeed, this book shows how Salters’ evolved over more than 150 years and how those in charge helped it overcome some of the difficulties that such businesses encountered. It also demonstrates how a company was affected by the changing social status and personal interests of those running it.

Notes

1Daily Mail, 25 January 1943.

2 The firm was originally known as ‘J. and S. Salter’, but became ‘Salter Bros’ in 1890 (and a limited company of the same name in 1915).

3 In the late Victorian period the river above London was often described as the ‘Upper Thames’. In this study it is defined as the waterway above Staines, which was where the majority of the firm’s activities occurred. Staines was also the jurisdictional boundary of the river authorities.

4Oxford Times, 4 January 1890, in C.J. Day, ‘Modern Oxford’, in A. Crossley (ed.), The Victoria History of the County of Oxford, vol. 4 (Oxford, 1979), p. 216.

5 Report of the Oxford Diocesan Social Services Committee (1908), p. 33, in Day, ‘Modern Oxford’, p. 217.

6 S. Ward, O. Stewart and E. Swyngedouw, ‘Cowley and the Oxford Economy’, in T. Hayter and D. Harvey (eds), The Factory and the City (London, 1993), p. 67.

7 Ibid., p. 70.

8 J. Betjeman, John Betjeman’s Oxford (Oxford, 1938), p. i.

9 Day, ‘Modern Oxford’, p. 182.

10 Ward, Stewart and Swyngedouw, ‘Cowley and the Oxford Economy’, p. 71.

11 Ibid., p. 117.

12 J.M. Mogey, Family and Neighbourhood (Oxford, 1956), pp. 6–7.

13 Published as S. Wenham, ‘Salters’ of Oxford: A History of a Thames Boating Firm over a Century of Evolution (1858–c. 1960)’, Oxoniensia, vol. 71 (2006), pp. 111–43.

14 See Hayter and Harvey, Factory and the City, T. Sharp, Oxford Re-Planned (London, 1948), R.C. Whiting, The View from Cowley (London, 1993), and R.C. Whiting (ed.), Oxford: Studies in the History of a University Town since 1800 (Manchester 1993).

15Limited Edition, 12 December 2008.

16 M. Prior, Fisher Row: Fishermen, Bargemen and Canal Boatmen in Oxford, 1500–1900 (Oxford, 1982), pp. 298–325.

17 W.J. Freer, ‘Canal Boat People 1840–1970’ (Nottingham University PhD thesis, 1991), pp. 132–330.

18 D. Blomfield, ‘Tradesmen of the Thames: Success and Failure among the Watermen and Lightermen Families of the Upper Tidal Thames 1750–1901’ (Kingston University PhD thesis, 2006), pp. 90–2, 259–61.

19 R. Stewart-Beardsley, ‘After the Railway: A Study of Socio-economic Change in Five Rural Parishes in the Upper Thames Valley, 1830–1901’ (Reading University PhD thesis, 2009), p. 193.

20 B. Cohen, The Thames 1580–1980: A General Bibliography (London, 1985).

21 P. Burstall, The Golden Age of the Thames (Newton Abbot, 1981).

22 F. Dix, Royal River Highway: A History of the Passenger Boats and Services on the River Thames (Newton Abbot, 1985).

23Waterways World, January 1974, pp. 32–33 and March 1998, pp. 54–55, Canal and Riverboat, November 1981, pp. 39–41, Old Glory, March 1996, pp. 28–33, and Canal Boat and Inland Waterways, April 2005, pp. 78–83 and February 2011, pp. 60–63.

24 S.M. Wenham, ‘Oxford, the Thames and Leisure: A History of Salter Bros, 1858–2010’ (Oxford University DPhil thesis, Michaelmas 2012).

25 Turks’ history is recorded in Classic Boat, August 2010, pp. 62–65, whilst Hobbs’ is in Thames Guardian, spring 1998, pp. 16–17.

26 K.C. Barnaby, 100 Years of Specialized Shipbuilding and Engineering (London, 1964).

27 A.E. Tagg and R.L. Wheeler, From Sea to Air: The Heritage of Sam Saunders (Newport, 1989) and R.L. Wheeler, From River to Sea: The Marine Heritage of Sam Saunders (Newport, 1993).

28 Popular books have been written about Blackwell’s (bookshop), Cooper’s (marmalade), Lucy’s Ironworks, Morrell’s (brewery), Morris (car manufacturer), Oxford University Press, Symm’s (builder) and Taunt (photographer).

29 J. Hill, Sport, Leisure and Culture in Twentieth Century Britain (Basingstoke, 2002), p. 1.

30 Ibid., p. 2.

31 K. Roberts, The Leisure Industries (Basingstoke, 2004), p. 3.

32 J. Walton and J. Walvin (eds), Leisure in Britain 1780–1939 (Manchester, 1983), p. 3.

33 P. Horn, Pleasure and Pastimes in Victorian Britain (Stroud, 1999), p. 19.

34 Walton and Walvin, Leisure in Britain, p. 3.

35 P. Bailey, Leisure and Class in Victorian Britain (London, 1978), p. 182.

36 J. Walvin, Leisure and Society 1830–1950 (London, 1978), p. 62.

37 S. Jones, Workers at Play: A Social and Economic History of Leisure (London, 1986), pp. 3–15.

38 P. Borsay, A History of Leisure (Basingstoke, 2006), p. 218.

39 Ibid., p. 21.

40 Ibid., p. 25.

41 P. Bailey, ‘The Politics and the Poetics of Modern British Leisure: A Late Twentieth-Century Review’, Rethinking History, vol. 3, issue 2 (1999), p. 137, in Borsay, History of Leisure, p. 15.

42 J. Lowerson, Sport and the English Middle-Classes 1870–1914 (Manchester, 1993), p. 7.

43 Borsay, History of Leisure, p. 24.

44 Ibid., p. 30.

45 Ibid., p. 40.

46 Ibid., p. 13.

47 N. Wigglesworth, The Social History of English Rowing (London, 1992), p. 50.

48 Stewart-Beardsley, ‘After the Railway’, p. 112.

49 L. Tickner, ‘Messing About in Boats: E.J. Gregory’s Boulter’s Lock: Sunday Afternoon (R.A. 1897)’, Oxford Art Journal, 25 February 2002, pp. 1–28.

50 A. Byerly, Are We There Yet? Virtual Travel and Victorian Realism (University of Michigan, 2013), pp. 1–134.

51 Wigglesworth, History of Rowing, pp. 92–116.

52 J. Armstrong and D.M. Williams, ‘The Steamboat and Popular Tourism’, Journal of Transport History, vol. 26, issue 1 (March 2005), pp. 66–77.

53 D.M. Williams and J. Armstrong, ‘The Thames and Recreation, 1815–1840’, The London Journal, vol. 30, no. 2 (November 2005), pp. 25–36.

54 Borsay, History of Leisure, p. 38.

55 Roberts, Leisure Industries, p. 3.

56 M.B. Rose, ‘The Family Firm in British Business 1780–1914’, in M.W. Kirby and M.B. Rose (eds), Business Enterprise in Modern Britain: From the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Century (London, 1994), p. 61.

57 M.J. Wiener, English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit (Cambridge, 1982).

58 D. Landes, Dynasties (London, 2006), p. xiv.

59 F. Crouzet, The Victorian Economy (London, 1982), p. 407.

60 A. Marshall, The Principles of Economics (London, 1890), pp. 299–300, in T. Nicholas, ‘Clogs to Clogs in Three Generations? Explaining Entrepreneurial Performance in Britain since 1850’, Journal of Economic History, vol. 59, no. 3 (September 1999), p. 688.

61 Ibid., p. 711.

62 M. Doepke and F. Zilibotti, ‘Occupational Choice and the Spirit of Capitalism’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 123, issue 2 (2008), p. 747.

63 M.B. Rose, ‘Beyond Buddenbrooks: The Family Firm and the Management of Succession in Nineteenth Century Britain’, in J. Brown and M.B. Rose (eds), Entrepreneurship Networks and Modern Business (Manchester, 1993), pp. 7–11, and M.F.R. Kets de Vries, Family Businesses: Human Dilemmas in the Family Firm (London, 1996), pp. 18–22.

64 Institute of Directors, Family Businesses (London, 1996), p. 5.

65 Landes, Dynasties, p. xi.

66 F.M.L. Thompson, Gentrification and the Enterprise Culture (Oxford, 2003), p. 140.

67 Ibid., pp. 160–61.

68 Rose, ‘Beyond Buddenbrooks’, pp. 3–14.

69 Ibid., p. 5.

70 Rose, ‘The Family Firm’, p. 76.

71 Kets de Vries, Family Businesses, p. 17.

72 A. Colli, The History of Family Business, 1850–2000 (Cambridge, 2003), p. 13.

73 Ibid., p. 26.

1

The Sport of Rowing

Were its colleges to disappear one by one, were Ruskin to be forgotten, so long as Salter’s boat-house stands by Folly bridge, it will be a trysting-place for the oarsmen of England.

Elizabeth Robins Pennell, 18891

John and Stephen were the fourth and seventh of eight children born to James and Elizabeth Salter, in 1826 and 1835 respectively (see family tree, p. 187). At the time, the family were living in ‘The Duke’s Head’ pub in Parsons Green (near Fulham),2 where James was the publican. He was also a carpenter, which may have influenced his sons subsequent move into boat-building. By March 1836 they had crossed the Thames to take over ‘The Feathers’ pub, in Wandsworth by the mouth of the river Wandle.3

‘The Feathers Boat House, c. 1890.

The distance of the relocation was less than a mile, but it was significant because it brought the family into direct contact with the world of aquatic leisure. Not only was the pub situated on a section of the Thames that was becoming one of the major centres for rowing in the country, but the move coincided with a ‘vital stage’ in the development of the sport (1830–80). This was when a ‘new breed’ of professional oarsmen was emerging, whose contests helped greatly to increase the popularity of rowing. In this ‘era of professional champion and personality’, the oarsmen benefited from ‘good training waters, expert coaching and excellent equipment’, before prohibitive legislation was introduced towards the end of the century, which would begin to marginalise non-amateurs in the sport.4

Waterside taverns, like that owned by the Salters, played an important part in the development of rowing:

Small groups of enthusiasts got together and bought or hired boats and rented changing-rooms from boatyards or pubs, and these associations or groups of oarsmen often took their names from those of the boats in which they rowed.5

Many clubs ‘owed their very existence to boat hirers’ because they were reliant on members being able to use craft at a reduced rate.6

Rowing histories seldom mention ‘The Feathers’, but in the Victorian period it was a well-known training establishment with on-land exercise facilities, including a 100-yard cinder track.7 As well as renting out pleasure boats, the pub, whose licence had transferred from James to Elizabeth in 1840,8 hosted a large number of clubs, including some that regularly competed in the early years of the Henley Regatta, like Wandle and Wandsworth. The crews probably used craft constructed on the premises and it is likely that this is where the Salters first learnt to build boats. By 1855, ‘The Feathers’ had also established a reputation for being where ‘the North countrymen train’ and ‘the champions are cared for’.9 The former was a reference to the number of famous Tyneside oarsmen who used the premises, whilst the latter was a reference to the work of Harry Salter.

Sporting activities were often arranged or promoted at pubs, and it was Harry who was the key individual responsible for elevating the reputation of ‘The Feathers’. By the mid–1850s he was considered to be ‘highest among trainers’, owing to ‘the great number of winners’ he had trained.10 In particular, it was by coaching a string of competitors for the Championship of the Thames, the most prestigious professional race at the time, that he made a name for himself. The event, which at that time involved the two leading oarsmen of the day (the title-holder and a challenger) competing over the university course for a typical prize of £400, was hugely popular and drew large crowds to the river.

Harry was associated (as coach, agent and occasionally umpire) with at least one of the two competing oarsmen in every Championship race from Thomas Cole’s victory in 1852 to Henry Kelley’s defeat in 1868. Furthermore, in his testimonial from the late Wandle Rowing Club, he was described as ‘frequently neglecting his own interests’ in order to play ‘a most active part in nearly every rowing match of his day’.11 Another indication of his reputation was that his ‘Hints on Rowing’ (both for ‘the gentleman amateur’ and ‘watermen and tradespeople’) was included in the first two editions of the annual Rowing Almanack (1861 and 1862). This was ahead of its time in taking a scientific approach to the condition of the oarsmen,12 and it combined rowing on the water with land-based training, like the ‘novel’ exercise of skipping and the use of dumbbells.13

Given that they were brought up in such a centre of rowing, it is unsurprising that the Salter family became competitive oarsmen themselves. One of the earliest records of their competing was in the Thames Regatta of 1841 when Harry’s Isis crew (from Wandsworth) lost to Lambeth Aquatics Club in the four-oared Tradesmen’s Challenge Cup.14 He was around 18 at the time and it was at a similar age that his younger brothers (John, George, Stephen and Alfred) all began rowing in the major regattas, sometimes with other family members and presumably in boats that the family had built. The Salters were not amongst the famous professional oarsmen of the day, like ‘Coombes, Cole, the Mackinneys, Newell, Messenger, Kelley and Chambers’,15 but they would have been well known in rowing circles as they regularly competed at the top non-amateur contests, including the waterman’s race at the Henley Regatta of 1851. It was Stephen, who coxed in the Thames Regatta of 1841 at the age of 6, who became the most accomplished individual oarsman. In 1856, he was Henry Kelley’s (the Champion of the Thames) ‘principal companion in practice’16 and he enjoyed success on both the home front, including winning the Apprentice sculls at Thames National Regatta in 1857 (for which he received the freedom of the Thames), and several of the rivers of Europe, including winning the International Regatta at Antwerp in 1858.17 He considered his greatest personal triumph to be his victory against the Chelsea Landsman George Drewitt over the university course for a wager of £40 each.18

In terms of the future business, the most important result of their early involvement with the sport may have been the relationship the Salters forged with the Clasper family from Newcastle. Harry Clasper (1812–70) was one of the most important figures associated with rowing. As well as becoming a famous and successful oarsman, he helped to popularise a number of significant design changes to the racing craft, including, most notably, the use of outriggers in the 1840s. These enabled boats to travel much faster because of their narrower, lighter, construction.19

It is not clear exactly when the two families first met, but the Claspers had trained at ‘The Feathers’ regularly enough for it to be called their ‘old quarters’ by 1849.20 This was also the year when some kind of arrangement between the two families was struck. By September, John had travelled up to Newcastle to spend an extended period of time with Harry Clasper.21 The following year he competed with them in a number of northern regattas, resulting in a second place at the Talkin Tarn regatta, and victories in both the Manchester and Salford Regatta (the Chadwick Cup and the Ellesmere Plate) and the Tees Regatta (the Tradesmen’s Plate).22 The main purpose of the trip was probably to gain practical boat-building experience. This was presumably the implication of the later statement in Bell’s Life, which described him as ‘John Salter of Wandsworth who was formerly with Clasper of Newcastle’.23

Immediately following this, the family was building racing-craft to a high standard. Their boats had considerable success in the 1850s, including victories in both the professional and amateur Championships of the Thames (in 1852 and 1853 respectively), and in a number of the contests in Cambridge, including the Colquhoun Sculls in 1854 and both the college four-oared and sculling races in 1856.24 The arrival of the Salters at the pinnacle of their field was confirmed in 1857 when they built their first eight used by Cambridge University in the Boat Race against Oxford.25 This particular craft was not victorious, but the following year John and Stephen Salter, now leading racing boat-builders, decided to set up a partnership (known as ‘J. and S. Salter Boat Builders’) in Oxford, a city with one of the most vibrant and active rowing scenes in the country. They bought Isaac King’s business for £1,300 (paid in instalments), which included the boats and ‘stock in trade’.26 It is likely that they heard about the sale of the yard through their connections in the sport of rowing and it is also possible that the ‘great stink of London’, caused by pollution in the Thames and an unusually hot summer, may have encouraged their decision. Jackson’s Oxford Journal suggested that the brothers came with quite a reputation: ‘From the high position occupied by Messrs Salter, in the aquatic world, there can be no doubt that Mr King has found worthy successors in that well known firm.’27

Salters’ and the University Boat Race

The first rowing contest between the universities of Oxford and Cambridge was held in 1829, and it was on the barge of a Folly Bridge boat-builder, Stephen Davis, that the initial challenge (from Cambridge) was posted.28 The event, which was held annually from 1856, was significant for the boat-builders who supplied the craft, because of the publicity it received, not only in Britain, but also internationally. It has been argued that the race helped to launch modern sports journalism,29 and the subsequent reporting helped its popularity further. This was part of a wider transformation in the communication of sporting news through specialist publications, like Bell’s Life in London and Sporting Chronicle (first published in 1822), which had a circulation in excess of 30,000 by the 1860s.30

Table 1.1 The leading racing boat-builders associated with the Boat Race during the era of wooden construction (based on the winners only)31

Date

Leading firm

Number two

1829–1836

No market leader

1839–1856

Searle

King / Hall

1857–1860

Taylor

Searle

1861–1869

Salter

1870–1875

Clasper

Salter

1876–1881

Swaddle and Winship

1882–1891

Clasper

1892–1898

Rough

Clasper

1899–1908

Sims and Sons

1909–1914

Rough

Sims and Sons

1920–1936

Sims and Sons

Bowers and Phelps

1937–1954

Sims

1955–1964

Banham

Sims

1965–1972

Sims

1973–1976

No market leader

By tracing the history of the boat-builders involved with the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race (Table 1.1), one can gain an insight into how the racing boat industry worked and which were the leading firms at any given time. Many factors dictated whether a firm was used by one of the crews to build a craft. Firstly, it needed to have a history of success at a lower level, which is what Salters’ enjoyed at Oxford and Cambridge before it was commissioned to build its earliest craft for each of the universities. It was important for the constructor to have a close relationship with those competing in their boats,32 and it is unsurprising, therefore, that many of the leading boat-builders were also professional oarsmen themselves. Indeed, the design of the racing craft was slowly refined through an on-going ‘arms race’ between the respective boat-builders, by which they (or a client) tested both their muscle and the merits of their vessel in competition. If a loss was blamed on the craft, they could copy a competitor’s design and/or refine their own boat in order to make it faster. This process led to the eights slowly changing in appearance. The first winning boat of 1829, for example, was 45ft in length, weighed 972lb and resembled a pilot gig from Cornwall,33 whilst those used a century later were typically 62ft 6in in length and weighed approximately 350lb.34 There were also certain ‘schools’ of boat-building that influenced one another. Initially firms based on the Thames dominated the event, but by the middle of the nineteenth century the balance of power had shifted to Tyneside. Between 1857 and 1898 all but one of the victorious craft were built by firms from the Newcastle ‘stable’, such as Taylor, Clasper and the partnership of Swaddle and Winship. The only two seeming exceptions (Salter and Rough) were both trained by the Claspers; the former, as mentioned, had been with Harry Clasper in 1850, whilst the latter was John Clasper’s son-in-law and ex-employee. The Thames yards then regained the ascendency and much of the twentieth century was dominated by George Sims and Sons of Putney (founded in 1891) and a rival firm set up in Hammersmith by his grandson of the same name. The Cambridge firm of H.C. Banham enjoyed a brief period of success in the mid–1950s, but by the mid–1970s there was no overall market leader.

Secondly, the location of the boat-builder was important. The Oxford firms of Salters’ and Rough produced many more boats for the dark blues than they did for the light blues, whilst the opposite was the case for Searle and Banham, who both had bases at Cambridge.35 It was common for boat-builders to try and increase their market share by relocating to new areas or by operating from more than one yard. Salters’ was not only based at Oxford, but it also had a second site at Eton from 1870 to 1875. The latter was a strategic location, because Eton College provided nearly a third of the individuals who competed in the race up to 1954 (over five times as many as the next most prolific school).36 In 1870, for example, the Oxford crew (including five Etonians) requested that their boat from Salters’ was a facsimile of their college craft that had been built by Mat Taylor.37 As this suggests, the same firm did not always build eights in an identical manner and requests like this could help with the refinement of their design. According to Lock to Lock Times, Salters’ did ‘much towards perfecting the racing boat’,38 and the two fastest times its craft set in the nineteenth century came after a number of years of building for the race (in 1868 and 1869).39 The latter, a 56ft 4in craft that had taken around a month to build, was said to have benefited from an unusual design feature:

… she seemed to us to trim somewhat more towards the stern than is usual … but we were informed by her builder that this was an intentional peculiarity … with the object of exposing as little as possible of her stern to the action of the wind.40

Thirdly, the result of the race had a significant bearing on which supplier would subsequently be used. Between 1839 and 1873 the losing crew changed their boat-builder on sixteen occasions, whilst the victor only changed theirs on five occasions. Although this was not the case with the first craft that Salters’ built for Cambridge, the two times that Oxford switched to using the firm (1861 and 1976) was following a loss in the previous year. By the same token, a prolonged series of victories for one crew could mean a corresponding period of dominance for their boat-builder. This was the case for both Oxford’s unbroken run of nine successive victories from 1861 to 1869 and Cambridge’s run of thirteen successive victories from 1924 to 1936, when the crews kept faith with their constructor (Salters’ and Sims respectively). These periods included races when both crews used the same supplier of craft, which was said to be ‘the summit of every boat-builder’s ambition’.41 During the 1860s, for example, Salters’ was ‘at the head of the trade’42 (see p. 35) and the firm was described as the ‘usual’ provider of the craft, because it built for both Oxford and Cambridge for five successive years between 1865 and 1869 (as well as in 1862).43 Yet this was one of the reasons why commentators looked elsewhere to explain Oxford’s dominance at this time. The dark blues were said to have been helped by the retirement of Cambridge’s coach, Tom Egan, in 1861, for example. Furthermore, the resurgence of the light blues in the 1870s was believed to have been heavily influenced by both Oxford’s head coach, George Morrison (1863–68), switching allegiances in 1869, and the arrival of John Goldie, one of the most famous Cambridge rowers, who competed between 1869 and 1872.44

By the end of the nineteenth century the crews were switching their suppliers less often, which suggests that the differences between the respective makes of craft may have been less apparent than they once had been. In the forty races between 1873 and 1914, the losers changed their boat-builder on ten occasions, whilst the winners changed theirs on six (although the ratio becomes ten to three, if you treat Clasper and Rough as one, as they were part of the same family).45 Although there is not enough data to compare trends beyond this,46 the design of racing craft continued to evolve. By the mid–1970s there were still notable differences between craft, as Rowing reported that the leading British companies were basing their designs on the superior and more expensive foreign boats (Donoratico of Italy and Stämpfli of Switzerland).47

Yet the impact that the craft had in affecting the outcome of the race was often overlooked as commentators tended to focus on the composition and merits of the respective crews. An exception to this was if a particular design innovation was first introduced, like the outrigger (1846), the carvel-built keel-less hull (1857) and the sliding seat (1873). As most of the significant changes were adopted by both crews in the same year – having been tested first at a lower level – this gives the false impression that neither crew had a particular advantage in any given contest. Yet in the era leading up to the First World War, the majority of races (54 per cent) were contested by crews rowing in craft constructed by different boat-builders (Table 1.2).

Table 1.2 Number of races when the respective crews rowed in boats made by different boat-builders48

1820s: 1 out of 1 (100%)

1830s: 2 out of 2 (100%)

1840s: 6 out of 7 (86%)

1850s: 3 out of 6 (50%)

1860s: 4 out of 10 (40%)

1870s: 5 out of 10 (50%)

1880s: 3 out of 10 (30%)

1890s: 6 out of 10 (60%)

1900s: 4 out of 10 (40%)

1910s: 4 out of 5 (80%)

Overall total: 38 out of 71 (54%)

This was significant because there could be considerable differences between the boats, as was observed in the very first contest: ‘The Cambridge boat, though London built and launched new for the occasion and much gayer in appearance than the old Oxford boat, was far inferior in the water, dipping to the oar whilst the other rose to every stroke in fine style.’49