1970: WRG? What’s that then? The final part of our series marking WRG’s 50th year in which we look back at what was happening in 1970, and how Navvies Notebook reported it... 50 years ago... In the previous article in Navvies 303 I covered the actual launch of WRG in summer 1970 as reported in Navvies Notebook (to give the magazine its original title). Well, I tried to. But it was the ultimate ‘low key’ launch: although the WRG display made an impressive debut at the Inland Waterways Association’s National Rally of Boats at Guildford, in the pages of Navvies there was precious little to even give the faintest hint that some thing major was on the way - that Navvies and the canal volunteer movement that it served were undergoing a transformation: from being a magazine for assorted ‘mobile’ volunteers not attached to a particular project, into being a national organisation in its own right, with the magazine at the heart of what it did. But if Issue 26’s coverage of WRG’s arrival on the scene was scant basically the words “published by Waterway Recovery Group”, brief mentions of the “WRG bank” and a “WRG calendar” for sale, and “cheques payable to Waterway Recovery Group” for people ordering safety clothing by mail order then the “rather skinny” (in the editor’s own words) 16-page issue 27, published in November 1970, was marginally more forthcoming. It still wasn’t exactly prominent in editor and founder Graham Palmer’s leader column on the first page, but there was just a hint of an organisation and one of its roles in his comments about the “WRG Bank” being “under heavy pressure” having supplied safety gear and tools to various groups, his thanks to people for their support of this fund, and his appeal for more donations of trading stamps, coupons and cash to keep it going. Elsewhere in the magazine there’s another hint of the move from a magazine to an organisation: The WRG is having a social-cum-business type meeting at
the Albert public house [Victoria Street, London SW1 - it’s still there today!] on Friday the 4th December. Among events will be the first London showing of a film dealing with the Welshpool Working Party and the Montgomeryshire Canal in general, and discussion of future plans for 1971. Please try to come along if you can. I wonder what was planned at that meeting. Where did we work? This was pretty similar to the lists of sites that I included in previous issues (and the ‘eleven we made earlier’ photo feature on the cover pages of Navvies 303) - the diary pages showed that work was continuing on the Upper Avon, Pocklington, Kennet & Avon, Stratford and River Wey - but there were a couple of new projects on the horizon... Looking ahead: two new projects got a mention elsewhere in the mag. Firstly, the following appeared in the ‘Bits ’n’ Pieces’ column: Confirmed: that Stoke on Trent City Council, Staffordshire County Council and British Waterways Board have finally reached agreement, both physical and financial, concerning the restoration of the Caldon to Froghall; work is expected to commence shortly. That one was completed and reopened four years later in 1974. But there’s a second new project mentioned, which is still with us today, albeit usually referred to among canal restorers under the collective name of ‘Cotswold Canals’, covering both the Thames & Severn and the Stroudwater... Like that other disused canal in the south, the Wey & Arun, the Thames & Severn Canal still excites a lot of attention from would-be restorationists. One of these is Pete Stevenson, who has written a lot of letters to the press concerning the T&S. For those of yu who cannot yet decide upon your priorities, Pete writes the following: After reading Mr Household’s fine book of the canal
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