The Blackcountry Man trip boat is pretty well known in the area and many local people would have been onboard but a recent edition of “Towpath Talk” , the ever popular newspaper for canal boat enthusiasts,  recently featured a 2-page spread about the boat, its history and indeed its current role on the Stourbridge Arm.

Here are the extracts for Towpath Talk for your information:

“Black Country people were once the backbone of the Industrial Revolution – foundry workers, miners, glass turners – and the narrowboat with the namesake The Blackcountry Man is a living tribute to the heritage of local people. The Blackcountry Man was built in 1948 by Harris Brothers in Netherton for Stewarts & Lloyds of Halesowen.

It’s thought to be the last full-length 70ft boat built of riveted plates in the Black Country. In its more recent transformation, The Blackcountry Man was fitted with a Lister diesel engine, but was originally unpowered and would have been towed by a tug, a horse, or even the might of a man.

The boat was used for trade on the Birmingham Canal Navigations (BCN) until it changed career to become a maintenance craft for British Waterways (now the Canal & River Trust). Like many of the historic canal boats that have survived, The Blackcountry Man’s raison d’être had to be fluid with the times. In 1986 she was spectacularly converted to a passenger-carrying vessel for the Stoke on Trent National Garden Festival with the Queen Mother as prime guest. In 1991 she changed hands and was restored, and spruced up for new purpose in Stourbridge. The boat’s original crews would probably have raised their eyebrows over the addition of some fancies such as soft cushioned seats, side windows, loos, wheelchair access, taped music and (for goodness’ sake) a bar.

In her latest guise, The Blackcountry Man is a trip boat that carries passengers from the distinctive round-walled Bonded Warehouse to Stourton and Kinver. The journey can be enjoyed as a floating escape to the quiet backwaters of the Midlands, or seen as a voyage to discover local heritage or even a brazen excuse to experience this historic boat at intimate quarters. Like many of the best canal treasures, this boat refuses to retire. When the much respected boat operator Mick Bourne retired, Tom Downing and his father Andy took up the baton. Tom became the youngest boat master in the country at the age of 18, and he and his boat, The Blackcountry Man, both became national record breakers with local pride.

Cruises on The Blackcountry Man run from The Bonded Warehouse in Stourbridge along the Stourbridge Arm Canal and the Staffordshire & Worcestershire Canal. They also run special themed cruises and are available for private charter.”

Dates and timings vary and a full schedule of trips for 2019 together with an online Booking Enquiry Form can be found on the Stourbridge Navigation Trust website:

www.thebondedwarehousestourbridge.co.uk

Stourbridge Navigation Trust were most grateful to a number of bands who at very short notice filled in over the recent Open Weekend to cover a late cancellation … no panic ! We noticed that one of the bands, The Shambolics, had recorded a video clip in the Brindley Room down at the warehouse and thought that this was newsworthy because despite the room being used for a plethora of purposes, this is the first time, to my knowledge, that a band has made a video clip and posted it onto You Tube for potentially Global digestion.

I must admit that when I heard the band playing in the beer tent (where else !) I was most impressed as clearly the band are talented, technically competent and played some great tunes whilst having a great time – I particularly liked the “bluesy” numbers, though there was something for everyone to enjoy and let their hair down to.

I believe that by helping us out at short notice was mutually beneficial – certainly it solved an embarrassing problem for SNT but also the band promoted themselves really well and received a number of enquiries for potential  bookings – not surprising and much deserved.

Anyway, we hope that you enjoy the short clip which shows the band performing “The Letter” in their own inimitable style in the Bonded Warehouse.

On the 14th October one our Trustees, Lance Cartwright, guested on “Black Country Matters” – a weekly show hosted by another of the SNT’s Trustees, Dr Paul Collins on Black Country Radio 102.5

During the show a lively dialogue took place with Lance informing listeners in “radio land” about Stourbridge Navigation Trust “a registered charity, comprised of willing and able volunteers of a variety of ages, sex, experience and skills but with one thing in common and that is to ‘look after’ the Bonded Warehouse and the Stourbridge Town Arm to the very best of our ability.

The Trust was originally founded by the Staffs & Worcs Canal Society volunteers who came together to restore the then derelict Bonded Warehouse and rejuvenate the almost unnavigable Stourbridge Arm Canal. This spirit of volunteering has continued for over 40 years although mainly the efforts are now more focused on maintenance rather than restoration as well as developing the facility for use by the community (clubs & societies). All of the work required to maintain the buildings, the site and to manage the community activities is undertaken by a small group of volunteers. “

The Open Weekend was talked about in some detail before the conversation returned to the role of volunteers – “we are always on the look-out for new volunteers with any skills they may have and will be made very welcome by the group of regulars who aren’t necessarily canal boaters but merely wish to get involved with a unique community asset in someway that aligns to their skills, experience and availability.”

Lance and Paul confirmed that if anyone is interested in becoming a volunteer or indeed can bring skills / experience as a Trustee then they should simply pop down for a chat on any Tuesday morning when there will be someone around to describe the volunteering role in more detail. Lance concluded in saying “having been a Trustee for 3 years now I can safely say that Stourbridge Navigation Trust is a worthy organisation and the work is varied and fulfilling, so if there is anyone out there who has for instance just retired and wants to support a local charity then please get in touch“.

The weather was for once favourable on 20th/21st October for the Stourbridge Navigation Trust’s 2018 Open Weekend down at the Bonded Warehouse in Canal Street where thousands of visitors enjoyed a wonderful weekend of a wide variety of colourful entertainment in Autumnal sunshine.

Around 80 canal boats descended onto the Stourbridge Arm Canal for the event which also included a classic car display, steam engines, amusements, canal boat trips, a fairground organ, for the first time a hog-roast as well as other food outlets, a busy outdoor bar and a craft fair in the Bonded Warehouse. Music was also a theme of the Open Weekend with some quality bands  rocking the enthusiastic audience near the bar.

Stourbridge Navigation Trustee Chris Dyche hailed the event a big success and said “it was a delight to see thousands of local people enjoying all of the amenities which our canal side conservation area has to offer“.

The event was attended by The Mayor of Dudley, Cllr Alan Taylor and his wife Winifred who arrived on the Blackcountry Man boat together with Dudley South MP Mike Wood and ‘top brass’ from the Canal and River Trust.

Chris Dyche went on to add “Our objective at SNT is always to promote Stourbridge’s waterway and its environs for the benefit of everyone. The Trust is now gearing up for its seasonal annual Santa boat trips – Festive waterways outings with Santa will run throughout the day on the 15th/16th December, 22nd/23rd December and on the afternoon of Friday 21st December. Tickets priced at £9 each are now on sale – call 01384 395216 to book your places.”

Stourbridge Navigation Trust would like to thank everyone involved with or attending the Open Weekend for making the event a great success – boaters, musicians, stallholders, vintage car owners, food retailers, bar staff, our volunteers, Stourbridge Army Cadets and of course the local community as a whole who turned up in fine weather in their thousands made the event memorable and Stourbridge proud.

Tuesday Club were energetic again this week moving plenty of furniture around – as good as a workout in the gym ! Pictured is Gareth Pollard taking a breather after handling the old chairs down from the large shuttered windows on the circular end of the building.

As part of an internal refurbishment new carpet tiles were fitted in the Dadford/Whitworth rooms on 2^nd May and we also had a further 100 chairs delivered last Tuesday, 32 Burgundy for the Brindley room and 68 navy blue chairs for use in the Dadford room and the coffee bar area. The task for Tuesday Club was to remove the 160 older chairs down to the basement and then to replace them with the colour matched ones – quite a long job and on a warm day we certainly got a sweat on very quickly.

The new additions certainly have freshened up the rooms which do look very nice now as indicated in the photograph below of the new burgundy chairs placed around the walls of the Brindley room. Photographs of the refurbishment of the Dadford Room and the Coffee Lounge with new flooring and matching blue chairs can be found on the “Rooms for Hire” pages.

We were pleased that local community organisations (e.g. Scouts) could extend the life of many of the older chairs which were only slightly cosmetically looking a bit tired and they were soon snapped up and taken off site to their new homes.

We were delighted to be unexpectedly approached by a Mr Norman Shillingford who wanted to safeguard two paintings of canal-side buildings at Wordsley junction. Mr Shillingford is a descendant of the Shillingford family who occupied the premises for several years until the mid 1950’s. The paintings are of Junction House and Junction Cottage, two properties which stood at the head of the Stourbridge Arm at Wordsley Junction.

Junction House was originally the residence of the canal manager, and Junction Cottage was the toll keeper’s house and office

Mr Shillingford advises that the small figure by the property on the Junction Cottage painting is his mother. The family operated trip boats from the junction as illustrated in the article pictured below. He also recalled that as a child he once played a game of ice hockey on the well frozen canal – the lock forming one goal and the bridge the other – happy days !

The Junction Cottage artwork was painted by a disabled Wordsley artist named Ronnie Grove in 1979, being copied from the original which was painted in 1938 by a Mr J. Hammond.  The Junction House painting was produced by J.F. Hancox in 1986.

The paintings have been placed on the wall of the Boardroom and flank an existing picture of the lock at Wordsley junction.

Stourbridge Ghost Trail (an extract from the Stourbridge Chronicle by Luke Bartlett) … on the night of Friday 4^th November in 2016, Andrew Homer and a team of investigators took to the Bonded Warehouse to try to capture something paranormal on camera.

The three storey canal side building, which has parts dating back to 1799, is reported to play host to a variety of strange activities.

Both staff and visitors of the Bonded Warehouse are said to have experienced objects moving, doors opening and closing by themselves and mysterious figures appearing.

One of our esteemed Trustees (Chris Dyche ) states that there is allegedly a ghost of a man wearing a Cow-Gown (perhaps a former Store man?) who whistles through his teeth, and foot steps could be heard. Having worked in the building in the 1970’s when it was in a sad state of repair Chris found it to be a very spooky place to be in at times.

Author of “Black Country Ghosts and Hauntings”, Andrew Homer, told the Express & Star newspaper about what the investigation unearthed and how he managed to capture some of the supernatural goings-on with a small head camera.

Mr Homer said: “We had split into two groups with one group downstairs and another upstairs spending about 45 minutes seeing if we could experience anything. The upstairs group had put a trigger object down – a chair in the middle of the room with a child’s ball on it. Then my group went up ahead of me because I had to change the batteries on my head camera. I made my way upstairs and realised that the rest of the group were not there – I went over to the very edge of the room to switch my head camera on. What you hear on the video that it captured is the ball bouncing and I was nowhere near the thing – the chair was right in the middle of the room. We did try after that positioning the ball again and seeing if it would fall on its own but it didn’t. It had originally been up there for at least an hour”. We understand  that more ‘ghost hunts’ will be taking place at the bonded Warehouse during 2018 so look out for that in the local press.

So, there appears to be anecdotal and physical evidence of some sort of paranormal activity taking place in the Bonded Warehouse, but don’t let that put you off coming down to see us.!