MartinCJM

Hope you don't mind if I pull up a bollard. I have fond memories of holidays on Hayling Island when I was a kid, and still have a cousin living there now, so the hoy is a particularly engaging vessel for me. Martin

Beautiful craftsmanship and attention to detail Ed. I'm particularly struck by the visual difference in the diameters of the futtock shrouds that prompted your re-work. A lesser mortal would have left it at that!

I love the way all the different shapes, lines and volumes come together at the junction of mast and top. Almost architectural. Beautiful work, Ed.

Ed, double goof on my part: 1) NR should have been NL - Nepean Longridge, heaven alone knows how my brain rendered L as R, must be the onset of antiquity - and 2) I hadn't realised that it was George Campbell who did the drawings for Anatomy. A fine artist, witness his illustrations for China Tea Clippers. (Completely off-piste, China Tea Clippers features a magnificent Montagu Dawson painting on its cover, showing Taeping and Ariel hammering up the Channel at the end of their 'race' from Foochow in 1866. When I was growing up, a print of a different Dawson Painting, but featuring the same clippers, hung on our living room wall - another contributor to a lifelong interest. Curiously, unlike the vast majority of Dawson paintings, this one was not a straightforward ship portrait: the point of view was about twenty feet up in the leeward foremast shrouds (of Ariel, I think), looking down on frantic activity on the foredeck, with the other ship (Taeping, it would have to be) half a mile ahead and to windward, with furled royals and skysails and no stuns'ls. Must have been blowing a bit! Wonderfully atmospheric. The painting now hangs in my hallway.) Tony, great to hear that the Science Museum collection is still accessible. I need to plan a trip to the Smoke! Bob, a most excellent rendition of YA - can we see more? Martin

I last visited the Science Museum in Summer 2015 - my wife was singing in a choral concert at the Festival Hall (Vaughn Williams' Sea Symphony, appropriately enough) and I had a morning to spare in London. I emerged a disappointed man. No ship model collection. In fact a single ship model in the entire museum, in a section called 'The March of Progress' or some such. About a year ago, I had a long conversation with a friend of my step-daughter who happens to work at the Science Museum. She told me that the museum had effectively re-thought its public remit and decided that its primary role was the encouragement of young people to be interested in technology and engineering. Documenting - via artefacts - the nation's scientific and industrial heritage has to fit around the new mission statement as best it can...and that meant no room for ships. The ship models are in safe storage - probably in the museum's facility just outside Swindon - but there's little chance of them seeing the light of day any time soon. However, she did say that if this was something I felt particularly strongly about, I should write to the museum - it seems that the voice of the great unwashed still counts. By contrast, I went to the Rijksmusem in Amsterdam last year - what a truly marvellous collection of ship models and maritime artefacts. One gets the sense that the Dutch still have a profound sense of the importance of their sea-going heritage. Ed, what a lovely photograph. Imagine a protracted ahhhhhhhh. It encouraged me to pull out my copy of The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships for a browse. I'd quite forgotten what a great publication it is; the quality of NR's freehand drawings is really quite sublime. Then again, on clearing out my dad's books just last week (he passed on just last September) I came across a little tome called Freehand Drawing and Pictorial Illustration for Draughtsmen, from 1956. In fifty-odd pages it shows how to create accurate perspective drawings of complex mechanical equipment - its main example is a vertical milling machine, though there are also examples of bolts, boots, a cutaway motorcycle engine, girders and dynamos. These were drawing skills for which there was ready use and a lucrative market in the days before computers, skills which NR or Harold Underhill would have been entirely at home with. That said, no doubt NR would have leapt at the chance of using a modern CAD package.

OK, time to emerge from the closet. My name is Martin and I'm an Ed-oholic. A little background. Back in the late fifties when we were nippers, my dad took my brother and me to the Science Museum in London, a truly wonderful place for youngsters with a vivid imagination. What made the greatest impression on me was the fabulous collection of ship models. I was entranced, and thus began a lifelong fascination for all things nautical, preferably with sails. Years later I was running my own company based in the West End, and one of the few real pleasures of being in the heart of The Smoke was being able to take an afternoon off and wander down to the Science Museum to see the ships, this time with a mildly more discerning eye. Seeing Nepean Longridge's Victory after reading his book on its building was a particular pleasure. Sadly, they've all now been removed from display and are unlikely to emerge again any time soon. I came across this build log just before Christmas and spent a joyous week working my way through. I have to say, Ed's craftsmanship is the equal of the builders of those navy board models from the eighteenth century. But what is even better is his willingness to share with us exactly how it's done. Inevitably - you can see how my downfall progressed by easy stages - I acquired a copy of The American-Built Clipper Ship and devoured it, followed by a re-read of the build log accompanied by even greater amazement at Ed's felicity to the way the original was built. A copy of Volume 1 of Ed's trilogy from SeaWatch Books soon followed, which brought home Ed's commitment to process and basic building blocks which allow the complexity of the build to be broken down into manageable pieces, and turned me into a total devotee. Ed, I just love your work, your commitment, your style and your passion. So there it is. I'm and Ed-oholic. Both volumes of Ed's Naiad build are heading across the Atlantic as I write this. Discovering your work has been a rare pleasure, to be savoured at great length. Martin