In the late 1960s Crystal Hale took on the British Waterways Board to save the City Road basin of the Grand Union Canal on the edge of Islington, north London. The result of her victory was her founding in 1970 of the Islington Boat Club, used by 7,000 children a year. Hale was once described by her brother as having all the qualities of Queen Bodicea – excluding the bloodthirsty ones. Others drew parallels with Lady Bracknell, Florence Nightingale and Barbara Castle.
Crystal had loved boats and boating all her life; from her house in Noel Road by the Regents Canal, she had looked out over the Basin and thought “Crystal, along with friends, family and neighbours, worked with the local authorities to set up a local management committee and create the club, which opened in 1970. At the same time, they fought the closure of City Road Basin. Originally, this had extended under and beyond City Road – when the club opened this had been filled in, but the water extended up to the bridge. Since the late 1960s, British Waterways had plans to fill in the entire basin and build on new land.
Throughout the mid-70s the “Save the Basin” campaign continued and eventually, through Crystal’s efforts, the Greater London Council rejected the BWB’s plans. Eventually only a small portion of the Basin was lost at the City Road end, for the electricity sub-station. The club was originally set up on the east bank of the basin, with access from Wharf Road through the council depot, which the children had to go through to reach the club. The club base was an old Thames barge, brought up from the river, and named The Water Gipsy, after the novel by Crystal Hale’s father AP Herbert. Initially everything was in the barge – equipment, changing rooms, old armchairs round a wood stove, and a place to brew up hot drinks. Some basic wooden pontoons were made and there was a fleet of rowing boats, optimist sailing dinghies and a rack of kayaks. Soon a couple of old prefabs were moved into the council yard for improved facilities, boat maintenance and an office for the club leader. There was no other land access to the basin. It was in fact quite isolated, surrounded by wood yards and building firms and by the disused and derelict warehouses of BDH, but it provided a uniquely secluded and safe area of water.
Then in the late 70s, plans went ahead to develop the land round the Basin and the old buildings were demolished; in fact it was sadly just a few years too soon for some of the old warehouses to be preserved (later they would almost certainly have been converted into attractive waterside apartments). During this redevelopment the club was re-sited on the west bank with access from Graham Road, and the developers provided a purpose-built club house, with full facilities for the members, offices and maintenance areas. There was now a strip of land for the club’s use; the Water Gipsy was refitted and remains today as an additional recreational space and a games room.
Originally the club was envisaged as a place for children to enjoy being in boats; as an adventure playground on water. This it still is, but as the club has developed, there has been a growing emphasis on watersports skills and expeditions to other waters, combined with an equal emphasis on youth work and the personal development of the young people through their participation in these activities. The aim is that the club should be a resource and facility for use by a variety of groups from schools and other organisations. The club has always aimed to appeal equally to children who just want to have fun on water, and those who want to specialise in skills and qualifications.
Crystal was born the eldest daughter of the writer Sir Alan (AP) Herbert. He wrote the musicals “Bless the Bride” and “The Water Gypsies, about the enchantment of the inland waterways. It was a delight his daughter shared. She and educated at the Dragon school, Oxford – where the girls played rugby – and St Paul’s school, Hammersmith, where the family house was by the river and her father wrote extensively about the Thames and life on the river. Crystal carried on her father’s great enthusiasm for everything to do with boats – on the sea, river, and canal – throughout her life. She then lived with a family in Frankfurt, avoided marriage to a young German, and learnt the language. Back in England, aged 18, she married John Pudney, a writer, radio producer and poet, whose poem, For Johnny, was made famous by Michael Redgrave in the 1945 film The Way To The Stars.
The newly-weds motor- cycled off to make their home in Cornwall, and Crystal acquired a converted lifeboat. She once enticed the editor of the New Statesman, Kingsley Martin, to crew for her. As war closed in, John and Crystal took on a farm in Essex. From there she worked on the BBC radio programmes, The Country Magazine and Woman at War, a precursor of Woman’s Hour. Post-war she edited Family magazine.
In 1955 Crystal and John were divorced, and she married Lionel Hale, the playwright and sometime co-chairman of the radio programme, Round Britain Quiz. Thirteen years later they moved to an Islington house overlooking the Grand Union Canal.
Crystal was an obvious god-earth mother of the Islington chattering classes. Chris Smith, when a young MP, earned her approval and they continued to hold each other in great affection. She moved amongst “fellow socialists” such as Diana Duff-Cooper, Freya Stark, Rebecca West and Moira Budberg, who claimed friendship with Chekhov and Maxim Gorky.
She continued to be an active member of the Boat Club committee for the rest of her life. In 1975 she founded the Angel Community Narrowboat Association to provide residential canal trips for Islington young people, designing the boat herself and, in 1987, with the late Jim Lagdon she founded the Angel Canal Festival in City Road Basin.
In 1996 the Royal Yachting Association gave her its award for social achievement on the water. She passed away in 199, aged 83. In September 2011 an Islington People’s Plaque was unveiled by her daughter Rebecca, sited on the wall of Hanover School, looking down towards the City Basin. Crystal is survived by a son and two daughters from her marriage to John Pudney, and by a daughter from her marriage to Lionel Hale. At her funeral, as she had requested, her coffin was carried through the Islington tunnel on The Angel narrowboat.
http://www.islingtonboatclub.com
Steve
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