THE two men who secured the Waverley for £1 five decades ago joined hundreds of passengers on board the paddle steamer this week for a Golden Jubilee sailing.
Douglas McGowan MBE and Terry Sylvester, representing the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society (PSPS), were gifted the iconic ship on August 8, 1974.
A 50th anniversary cruise departed from Greenock's Custom House Quay on Thursday morning to mark the milestone.
The special sailing saw Waverley visit Ardrossan for the first time in a decade.
Before joining passengers on board for the trip, Douglas and Terry recreated a photograph from the day the paddle steamer was officially handed over.
Terry and Douglas handing over the £1 on August 8, 1974 (Image: Waverley Excursions)
The pair became good friends after meeting in Dunoon in 1970, with both sharing an ambition to keep Waverley going for as long as possible.
They organised a meeting with John Whittle, then general manager of the Caledonian Steam Packet Company, to present suggestions for the ship.
Terry said: “I put together a report in a folder with plastic pockets.
“When I look at it now, it looks dreadful but, of course, it was days before photocopiers and so on.
“I presented this to John and he very kindly accepted it.”
Douglas added: “John was very receptive. He was a lovely gentleman.
“He could easily have said, ‘what are these young upstarts doing telling me how to run my business?’.”
The friends were offered a meeting with the Waverley’s owners in 1973 after it was decided she would be taken out of service by what, by then, had become Caledonian MacBrayne.
Terry, from Barry in Wales, told the Tele: “It was November. I didn’t want to come up to Scotland in the middle of winter.
“I thought they would just give us the ship’s bell as a memento.”
Terry and Douglas at Custom House Quay (Image: George Munro)
Douglas said: “I went into the general manager’s office.
“Much to my utter amazement and surprise – it’s one of these days you never forget – he said they had decided to offer the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society the Waverley as a gift.
“To make it legal, we had to give them a pound.
“I phoned Terry that night and told him he was right, they were going to give us the bell – but they were giving us the rest of the ship as well.”
With help from former MacBrayne’s accountant Peter Reid, Terry calculated the Waverley was still a viable business if they could manage to sell enough tickets.
She eventually entered service under the ownership of the PSPS on May 22, 1975.
Douglas said: “When we got the ship and started, Terry sprinkled some of his marketing magic on the whole business and really punched home the fact that this was a very special ship.
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“That grasped the public’s imagination. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be here today.”
Terry and Douglas hope the Waverley can continue cruising for many more years to come, with their ‘great ambition’ being the paddle steamer reaching her 100th birthday in 2047.
Douglas added: “Personally what gives me a lot of pleasure these days is seeing the ship full.
“The Waverley is a living thing. She’s not stuffed and mounted in a museum. This actually works.
“You feel the sea breeze, you can hear the paddles, you can watch the engines.
“It’s for the next generation, and the next, and the next.”
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