Name Ripple

RIPPLE was built on the foreshore at St Ives by Henry Trevorrow and was registered as SS19 in 1896. Her construction is carvel with fifteen larch planks, plus a sheer strake on each side fastened to twenty eight oak frames. She fished until 1933 under the ownership of the Barber family.

RIPPLE was originally powered solely by her two lugsails but, in 1915, a 16 horsepower port wing engine was installed. Following a bad experience in a gale, the owner, William Barber, decided that RIPPLE should be lengthened by ten feet. She was taken to Peake's in Newlyn, sawn in half, and ten feet added to her middle. This was probably done in 1927 when her port engine was replaced by a new engine of 26 horsepower and an additional engine of the same power was fitted. The second engine is likely to have driven a central propeller. This change seemed to have paid off because she is reported to have been Newlyn's top landing boat between 1927 and 1932.

RIPPLE ceased fishing in 1933 after a serious engine fire at St Ives, which was only put out by the efforts of the local fire brigade. After a few years laid up at Lelant, she was sold and fitted out as a very elegant houseboat. For the next sixty years, RIPPLE remained in this role, based around the Fal estuary. For nearly fifty years of that time, she was moored at Porth Navas on the River Helford under the proud ownership of Arthur and Ralph Tomlin.

After three further owners, she sank at her moorings in Penryn and had to be taken ashore. After undergoing restoration to replace her damaged stem and stern post, as well as frames and hull planking, a new deck, plus a complete re-fastening of the hull, she also required a general re-fit to install her masts, rigging, sails and two wing engines.

On 12 October 2007, RIPPLE was relaunched amid much ceremony. A crowd of several hundred watched as she was hauled to the water by the local rugby team and the event was covered by West Country television and widely reported in the local press. Her owner was quoted as saying that RIPPLE symbolises regeneration in Newlyn and that she is a tangible example of the past working for the future. She is now once again a fully functioning sailing lugger, kept in her original setting at Newlyn as part of the fishing heritage and regularly sails in local waters, as she did a hundred years ago.