66
CLARE LALLOW
him arguably the most accomplished Solent helmsman of
his day. At the age of 16, and while still at school, Clare
sent him off to race with a customer’s Dragon and they
won the Edinburgh Cup; after that, the same year, he
went to Rome to maintain a boat for the 1960 Olympics.
In 1964 and 1968 he went to Tokyo and Mexico as part
of the GB support team. He has never forgotten the roar
of the crowds, the celebrations when medals were won,
the national pride. It was a far cry from the clinker
tenders of his great-grandfather’s day. The world was
moving on and Lallows with it.BALANCE CHANGES
By the mid-1950s the yard’s work involved 75 per cent
building boats, and 25 per cent servicing them. Its clients
included Thornycroft, Gilham, Aitken, men of
aspiration, industrialists, high achievers. Even so, in
those times it was possible to commission a yacht, race it
well and sell it for a profit at the end of the season.
Repeat orders resulted and Clare employed up to 40 men
at the peak. His clients often brought him Charlie
Nicholson designs to build. Lallow’s craftsmen produced
fast boats, and the prices were fair. And although the
final total might be agreed over a pint, using figures
scribbled on the back of a cigarette packet, Clare would
never charge a penny more, even if that meant a loss. His
word was his bond, which brought him insurance work
as well, because his prices never shifted.
Once when he left Ian in charge, an important
customer came and tried to bully the young man. Ian
stood his ground but when Clare heard about it he rang
and left a message with the client’s wife that he “never
wanted to see him back at the yard”. The two men
didn’t speak again. Ian remembers that as if it were
yesterday. It was typical Clare.
JS White’s photographer was employed to cover the
launches from these years, producing an album with
page after page of astonished faces as champagne corks
popped – a litany of famous yachts slid down those
second-hand ‘railtracks’ – Fastnet victor Clarion of
Wight, Round the Island winner Firebrand, Roundabout
and Carillion – always named by women and never a
new boat launched on a Friday. The old superstitions ran
deep, so much so that at least one boat was launched
precisely at one minute after midnight early on a
Saturday morning.
Launch days were bright moments, vessels decked
with flags and a party afterwards. Clare always worried
until the boats were safely afloat, because “you never
knew”, but often their owners went on to race them the
same day.
Lord Beaverbrook’s son Sir Max Aitken was a key
client, for whom Lallows built the mighty Drumbeat,
motor boat Humdrum, and of course, Roundabout.
Drumbeat was special, revolutionary in her day, with her
original twin keel in two segments. A special high shed
had to be constructed for the build, which is still in use
today.
Sir Max founded the London International Boat
Show in 1954 and Lallows organised three exhibits for
him in different years, displaying a SCOD when the class
first came out, then Roundabout, and finally a Dragon in- The magnate footed the bill – Lallows would
very clearly. It was ‘bespoke’. They could provide a paid
hand if you needed one. There was a special room
where each overwintering yacht had its own locker to
store everything portable. Come spring, crockery, sails,
ropes, and tackle were inspected, replaced, washed,
polished, mended and tweaked, so returning owners
could step aboard to find sails unfurled, or engine
running, with everything gleaming and ready for
departure.
Clare himself was always around, quiet and
unhurried, dressed in a crisp white shirt and tie, with his
perpetual black yachting cap. He called everyone [male!]
Sir, irrespective of their wealth or lack of it: “Because
you can’t go wrong with Sir; no-one can take offence.”
The workforce idolised him and felt genuine pride in
being employed at the yard.
Soon Clare’s son Ian started slipping into the
workshops after school and at weekends, just wanting to
“play around with boats”. Although he was the boss’
lad, the men treated him like an apprentice, finding him
jobs, and teasing when opportunity presented. He
remembers an orderly atmosphere, where everyone knew
what was expected, with far fewer mechanical tools than
now, so it was quiet. Of course there was banter –
sending one of the newbies off to Ratsey’s to get the
proverbial “key to the fog locker”, or to the chandler for
a “sky hook”, or “a bubble for the spirit level”.
Even Clare didn’t escape – the story goes that one day
he put his famous yachting cap on a cradle, which slid
down into the water. Everyone held their breath to see if
he would notice, and burst into laughter when he did.
George Abrook was the yard rigger in those days –
self-taught of course, but very skilled. He had once
owned his own barge, lifting ballast from Shingle bank
to sell on later, racing the tide to fill the hold with a
wheelbarrow and shovel, just himself and one ‘boy’, as
was usual on the barges. Clare employed him to give
sailing instruction in Sybil’s scow, and one day Ian asked
him to leave it unmoored – because he was “going out
by himself”. He was about 10. On his safe return Clare
didn’t scold – and from then on Ian was aboard every
boat going, motor or sail, delivering, testing, running
errands; anything to be on the water.
Clare hated the idea of his son joining the business,
knowing the long hours involved, but Ian was a lost
cause. Soon he was crewing and racing everybody’s
boats, gaining the skills which were eventually to makeBelow: Lallows
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