A Tribute to Tony Lewery
A
t the final meeting of the IWA Western Region the Titania Salver was awarded to Tony Lewery in recognition of his on-going contribution to the inland waterways. Tony Lewery comes from Brighton and trained at the local Art College. He then travelled north and lived with Romany Tony Lewery families before ending up at accepts the award from Harry Arnold Norton Canes where he did some work for Jim Yates. This is when he became fascinated with traditional ‘folk’ art and discovered the decoration on narrow boats. WATERWAY IMAGES
In 1965 Tony met John Stothert who had the idea of having a horse-drawn passenger boat at Norbury. Tony agreed to convert the IONA and work it for Shropshire Union Cruisers. He and his wife Mary moved to Norbury Junction, then one of the pioneering centres of pleasure narrow boat building and the hire boat industry. The majority of traditional painting and sign writing at Norbury was done by Bunny Bunford, Tony became involved in this work and practiced his growing skill in traditional decorative painting. During this time Harry Arnold and his wife, Beryl, worked at Norbury and lived on the STAR. Tony and Mary were their next door neighbours, living on IONA. After a year Tony left and went working on a Rodeo Show for horse dealer Tom Bowdler, living in a rented cottage by the Shrewsbury & Newport Canal before returning a year later to work at Norbury for a short while. Tony then bought the butty PRINCESS and converted it to live on before bow-hauling it up to the Bridgewater Canal. He worked a number of carrying boats for Jack Taylor and the Anderton Canal Carrying Company and repainted the fleet in Anderton colours. Tony later moved with his growing family to a canal side cottage just north of Preston Brook Tunnel. He undertook much boat repair and decorative work at the nearby base of Peter Froud including operating the trip boat LAPWING and keeping the fleet of hotel boats looking very traditional. His passion for and knowledge of the old working ways, the skills and decoration grew to the extent that he became the leading authority on the subject. By the
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