Wooden narrowboat 'Friday' for sale cheap

An interesting wooden narrowboat has just gone up for sale on Apollo Duck for £5,000:

(For Sale: Rare all-wood 45' Peter Keay narrowboat)

FRIDAY is a 1970-vintage 45 ft elm-bottomed '2-pot' Lister-engined boat of considerable charm (and equally considerable responsibility for any new owner), and it's currently moored at Mercia Marina.

Until now, my idea of a wooden narrowboat was something rather more like an old working boat.  Certainly you see very few wood-hulled boats built in a modern leisure narrowboat style.

Built at Keay's Boatyard in Walsall (one of the last commercial wooden boat builders), Friday is claimed to be one of only three leisure craft the Walsall-based commercial BCN builder ever made in its 65 years of operation.

(Pratt's Bridge is here on Google Maps; I presume the boatyard was nearby.)

I'd never heard of Peter Keay before, but that's my ignorance, not obscurity. 

A brief googlehunt turned up a DVD of video footage of the Keay boatyard at work in 1979 from industrial archaeology specialist IA Recordings:

For over fifty years [sic], until 1984, wooden narrowboats were built at the boatyard of Peter Keay & Son beside the Wyrley and Essington canal near Walsall. 

... The [1979] recording is a rare glimpse of a vanished trade. It features views of wooden and steel boats on the slips and in the sheds, the mixing of horse dung and tar for caulking a newly constructed wooden tug and a boatbuilder's reminiscences.

(It sounds like a fascinating DVD, and it's only £6.85.)

The owner of Friday has recently declined in health, has gone into sheltered accommodation, and is in no condition to maintain the boat, or even to return to it. 

Marina manager Robert Neff says it's too old and low-value to be sold on the upmarket Used Boat Company brokerage, and while the marina's official position is that it could be sold off to very cheaply just to pay mooring fees and return money to the owner, he thinks it deserves to go to a genuine enthusiast for wooden boats. 

He'd rather it went to someone who will work on it and restore it properly, rather than let it become just a short-lived home for a penniless 'traveller' who won't look after it.

I got a quick walk-through this morning, and my first impression was of the smell of damp and mould, and all the filth of a squat.  Even before you think of buying it, you'll want a deep clean.

But behind the mess some excellent workmanship was apparent, and some very clever ideas, including a foldaway bed that was the most ingenious I've seen on a modern-format leisure narrowboat.

If your offer is accepted, your first problem will be to find a boatyard willing to examine it and quote for repair. 

Naturally I called my own boat maven, Ray Bowern of Streethay Wharf, and I was naïvely impressed that he'd heard the name Peter Keay where I hadn't, and that it was going to be a wooden hull.

His instinct would be to crane it out (with wide straps) and examine not the bottom - which he thinks is likely to be still in good condition, particularly if the boat's been in the water long - but the sides, at the waterline. 

It's at the waterline where any problems are likely to occur he said.  Many boats of this age can rot here, but this could probably be patched up  with a fibreglass or metal plating.

The abundant algal growth on Friday, however, is a good sign says Ray, because it suggests the hull has been immersed a long time, protecting the all-important elm bottom.

The best-known name in wooden boats, though, is Jem Bates of Bates Boatyard, and when I spoke to him he said it was almost definitely well worth repairing - simply because it's a Keay boat. 

Jem said that the first thing to do was to take up the flooring and check the condition of the 2 1/2" elm bottom timbers and to ensure there was sufficient ventilation beneath the floorboards.  If there's one thing a wooden narrowboat hull needs, it's air to the inside of the hull.

It's this lack of underfloor ventilation that led to Cressy, the first modern liveaboard wooden boat, being scrapped in 1951, when it was barely 40 years old, the same age as Friday.  But back then, few people thought an old wooden boat as historic. They treated 'em almost as designed to be recyclable.

On the BCN Society website there's a short memoir about life around Pratt's Bridge during the heyday of the Keay boatyard in the 1930s, and the boatbuilding that took place there.  It's reprinted from a 1969 article originally in the Shropshire Union Canal Society newsletter, so would have been written at exactly the time Friday was being built.

The Historic Narrowboat Owners' Club has an annual Ken Keay Award for the 'most improved' wooden narrowboat in any particular year, named after Peter's son. 

So I guess whoever takes on responsibility for Friday will be a candidate for the award and the wooden boat fraternity - if there is such a thing - will be watching.

When I started this post, I'd planned it as a rumination on the nature of falling apart - both as a boat and as a human being - the owner of Friday being as frail as his boat. And I was going to observe how a boat can be renewed in a way that a man cannot.

But like most old men I quite forgot where I was and got a bit sidetracked.

Comments

[Shaun Mack]

Hi, well guess what? im the new owner of Friday (Well when everything is finalised) what do i know about narrowboats, nothing whatsoever, stepping onto Friday was the first time ive ever put foot on a narrowboat! (This is going to be so much fun & hard work) however, as a skilled fitter and expert DIYer (Thats what other people say about my DIY skills, im far to modest to think or even say that)i believe that i can return Friday to her former glory. Guess i thrive on challenges and cant wait to start this one. Anyway, any advice or historical information would be appreciated. Im based in Burton on Trent so Friday's location was / is ideal so if everything goes to plan, this time next year she will be back to her former glory (With a few more mod cons in the cabin, think thats what you call it)
I would just like to mention John, the former owner, what a lovely and interesting gentleman, the story's and knowledge he has are fascinating and second to none.He's a real character, my wife and i could of chatted to him for hours.

[Andrew Denny]

Chris Deuchar, historic canal boat expert emailed me with some fascinating background information:

Yes it was [always called Friday]!

I have found some old material which gives it as new in 1970. I have also been shown a poor quality (magazine/newspaper?) photo of it new at that time - looking very much like a smart view of what you see now -right down to the white topsides.

Pratts bridge wharf was a little to the west of the actual bridg incidentally. I remember it well - particularly the amazingly ramshackle yard in which work was done to an excellent standard and huge timbers and pieces of iron were moved about with the ease that only comes with long practice.

Ken Keay went bust - very sad because he was a real gentleman of the 'old school' black country - but not enough business acumen.

I last saw him, shortly before his death, presenting the award which bears his family name, at the Black Country Museum to the winner that year. His niece has since presented the award on his behalf on occasion.

Previously PK's boatyard was to the EAST of Pratts bridge but, when Worsey's ceased trading, he took over this one of their former (seven?) yards.

Ken Keay also produced a colour book of drawings and information which are well worth getting hold of.

Cheers
Chris D
http://www.Deuchars.org.uk
------------------------------

Thanks Chris!

[Ali]

Hi Andy,
There was an article in the London Evening standard yesterday about a woman suing her boat surveyor because her 450,000 pound boat sank. A bit more expensive than this one.
I thought you could cover the story on your blog. details are at;
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23823953-night-my-pound-450000-thames-houseboat-sank.do
cheers,
Ali (nb Tormentil)

[Graham Booth]

Just before Nick Grazebrook sold The Hilton, he discovered a wooden hull that had been built by Ken Keay. It was to be a leisure boat but was never finished.

He bought this and had a steel superstructure added by Canal Transport Services. The boat was called, appropriately, Ken Keay. He owned this boat until his untimely death in 2002.

Ken Keay produced some interesting sketches of his father's boatyard and details of working boats. You can buy a CD containing these images together with a DVD about Peter Keay's yard from Laurence Hogg Productions.

[Max Sinclair]

The late Nick Grazebrook had Ken Keay build The Hilton for his family use.