Tom’s blue plaque mission
Eton: Honouring master boat builder’s legacy
A rowing historian is on a mission to see a blue plaque installed in Eton to honour the legacy of master boat builder George Yeomans Pocock.
Tom Wigley began his quest last autumn when release dates for George Clooney’s rowing film The Boys in the Boat were announced.
The true-life saga tells how a rookie rowing team from the University of Washington quickly climbed from obscurity to win gold in the eight-man race at the 1936 Olympic Games.
Eton’s master boat builder George Pocock was instrumental in their success. Not only did he craft supreme rowing boats but he guided them and other teams towards Olympic gold for decades.
Representing today’s Eton rowing community and wanting to pinpoint those epic moments in rowing history, Tom applied to the Royal Borough Museum in the hopes that the publicity of the filming of Daniel James Brown’s book will cement Eton’s and George Pocock’s contribution to the international rowing scene.
He is hoping to have the commemorative plaque in place by the spring at The George Inn, in Eton High Street, where the Pocock family once resided.
“I’m a rower with the Eton Excelsior Rowing Club and I’m a bit of a local rowing history buff,” said Tom.
“I’ve read The Boys in the Boat book years ago, it is really popular with rowers, and I knew the film was coming out, so I was doing some research and I found out that George was living at The George Inn in the 1901 Census.
“I had a bolt of lightning that said: ‘We should get a blue plaque for this guy as it’s the right thing to do’.
“He is a son of Eton, he lived there with his father who was also a master boat builder for Eton College. Eton and Windsor have a huge tradition of rowing and some sources say that Eton College along with Westminster [College] sort of originated the sport that we recognise today.”
Having learnt his trade under his father, Aaron, a boat builder at Eton College, George left Eton in 1911, aged 20, and set sail for Canada to make his fortune.
His craftsmanship was in hot demand and he was soon building for boat clubs and Boeing’s flying boats in the Second World War, but it was the combination his knowledge and skillset that transformed lives in the University of Washington rowing team during The Great Depression.
“George had huge influence,” said Tom.
“He came from a long line of boat builders. So he knew how to build a boat and he knew how to make them go well and in addition he was able to give valuable coaching to this rookie crew.”
So inspiring is the tale that it is retold to every set of new rowing recruits at the University of Washington each year.
George is listed in the USA Rowing Hall of Fame and the Washington State Sports Hall of Fame and Tom wants to ensure his legacy is celebrated this side of the pond as well.
“There’s lots of good historical justification for the plaque and I think we need to celebrate local successes and we could do with a bit of a lift actually,” he said.
Tom hopes that the plaque will be decided upon and erected in time for April, when The Boys in the Boat is shown again in Windsor.
He is also hoping a certain Hollywood director will do the unveiling.
“I finally got some traction early this year when I wrote to local councillors and they got on to it. I am told by one of them that the museum is on the case.
“I also wrote George Clooney a snail mail letter but I’ve heard nothing yet.
“There’s quite a big Pocock ‘massive’ in the states, some of the guys who worked on the film and some of the movers and shakers there have been trying to contact George for me.
“Having him do the unveiling in April would be the cherry on the Pocock cake.”