Posted by andyb on August 18, 2005 at 00:22:20 from 81.131.121.148 user beardbiter.
In Reply to: Re: Swallow anew? posted by Jeremy Kriewaldt on August 16, 2005 at 01:20:23:
I agree very much with Jeremy. Although, I would be happy to go along with the idea of separate "Swallow Association" if I thought that a significant minority of TARs resented subsidising boats for other people to sail, there are costs to this solution. It would mean that there were 3 AR societies, 3 lots of admin costs, 3 lots of people needed to act as officers and so on. Is there a big enough pool of enthusiasts to support a 3rd AR society?
Then there are the costs to the members themselves. Many TARS, and potential TARs, might assume that a replica Swallow is exactly the sort of project they would expect TARS to engage in and be disappointed to learn that they had to join 3 societies (TARS, NBT and SA) to take part in the whole range of AR activities.
Of course I might be wrong. A new society might encourage more participation.
Certainly a replica Swallow would. It may sound a bit cheesy but I've had the privilege and pleasure of taking quite a few people in Cochy for their first ever sail. People who read the books as children but never imagined that they could take the tiller of Scarab. Now of course a replica Swallow would not have the extra special magic of having belonged to AR himself but TARs are imaginative people and nearly all of them would feel just a bit of that magic sailing in a boat that looked, felt and smelled like Swallow.