I was startled to read last week on Nev's Waterlily blog that his boat was built by the same man who fitted out Granny Buttons:
We were joined at Branston lock today by NB Clarice Elizabeth. The lady on board asked us if our boat was a Delph Marine which we confirmed.
She went on to tell us she knew the guy who fitted it out - Jack Prince. He brought the shell and fitted her out at Sawley Marina in 1992. She told us he came from Derby ... where we live !!
She said he did not have her long, selling her at Napton, which is where she was moored by the only other owner, who had her from 1994 until we brought her in 2007.
She then told us the next boat Mr Jack Prince build was on a Liverpool shell and is Granny Buttons!
So that make out boat related. Welcome to the family, Andrew !
Granny is indeed born of the boatbuilding skills of the late Jack Prince. He started it as a retirement project, and it hit the water as a sailaway from Liverpool Boats in 1995, which he fitted out himself, helped along by his wife Sue.
It was largely her interior design skills which 'sold' me on the boat. She it was who created the 'four-poster' effect of the bedroom, swathed in lace, and the spacious saloon and handy kitchen, amongst many other design features. Some were impractical, some gimcrack, but all of them had a certain flair.
They called the boat Jessel, an initialism formed from their family names - Jack and Sue, together with their children Simon and Louise.
Sadly his dream retirement, as so often happens with dreams, turned into a nightmare. He had barely finished it when he contracted cancer, and died before they had the chance to make many of the journeys they had together dreamed of.
I never knew Jack Prince, and bought the boat off his widow after she met another man and decided to strike out on a new life together with him.
I soon renamed Jessel as 'Granny Buttons', and I struck out in a new life on my own.
To be honest, all was not well behind the scenes of Jessel. I spent much money getting much of the work redone, and if you look closely at a lot of the woodwork you can see the joins. I remember going through Netherton Tunnel about six months after buying her, and all the lights went out! It turned out that much of the wiring was substandard and had to be redone.
Still, like an old slipper or a mistaken marriage, I grew accustomed to it and even learned to love my Granny. She has served me well.
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