For five years, from 1971-76, I lived on and restored a wooden Leeds & Liverpool Canal boat, the Pluto. There is more about the canal on my Leeds & Liverpool Canal pages. As a result of writing a history of Tom Puddings, the coal-carrying container boats once used on the Aire & Calder Navigation, I became Chairman of the South Dock Compartment Boat Hoist Co. Ltd. (A Charity) which is helping conserve the unique hydraulically-operated hoist and to help people to find out more about compartment boats and coal exports from Goole Docks on the River Ouse in Yorkshire.
Pluto and Mendip, with Charlie Atkins, at Preston Brook around 1975.
The origin of the narrow boat.
A brief history of English canals.
The history of commercial carrying on English canals.
A technical aspect of waterway history is covered in this article on gate paddles.
Some aspects of canal operation in times of war are described in boatmen in wartime.
The Bowes Report of 1956 into the condition of Britain's canals.
Some waterway links with India.
As part of the research during translation of Hans Uhlemann's book on Canal Lifts and Inclines of the World, I looked at British Boatlifts after Anderton.
Working life on the Finow Canal, a translation of a contemporary article about life on board a German canal boat early in the 20th century.
The eighteenth century boatlifts at Halsbruecke, near Freiberg in eastern Germany.
An early canal with two inclines in Upper Silesia known as the Gliwice Canal.
Dating from the eighteenth centuryand ninteenth century are several pieces of poetry which related to canals. A few examples of such canal related poetry can be found here.
A biography of one of the most important English canal engineers, Thomas Steers.
Video of motor and sailing barges on the Aire & Calder Navigation and near Berlin.
Some more canal images.
I also help produce Waterways Journal, an annual 72 page book produced for The Boat Museum Society. Each issue has four well-illustrated articles on canal history, of which I have written several over the ten years it has been produced. Copies at £6.50 each can be obtained from:
Boat Museum Society Waterways Journal Page where there is a link to an order form.
Other canal-related pages can be found at:
George's: Canal boating in the U.K. and Europe
Mike Stevens' Historical Canal Maps.
Railway &: Canal Historical Society.
Mike Clarke
Milepost Research
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