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The old eventide owners association was formed back in 1963 by builders and owners of the Yachting Monthly "Eventide" sailing cruiser to enable amateur builders to exchange views and experiences, and for the interchange of technical knowledge. On this page and in more depth on the what went wrong pages, which had been temporarily suspended to enable the eoa to apologise to us, but were then replaced, when they failed to make good their promises..... you will find an insight into the reasons for the formation of this group. I cannot find anyone who can condone the lies told by some of their officers in their take over bid. I had been a member of the eoa since 1973 and have held every post with enthusiasm, including the Presidency, (but excluding the treasurers role, I'm not that good with figures!). I was Editor for over 7 years and Secretary for even longer, till I resigned from the post in disgust at all the 'non owners' taking over the committee, and the stubbornness of the committee, (many of whom, it was later discovered, were secretly selling up), and refusing to heed the wishes of the membership. Because of my opposition to their attempts, the 'non owners' have now thrown the 'owners' out of the 'owners assoc'. I, and others, have been expelled, (illicitly, even by their rules), for standing up to the dictates of the president and for representing the views of the membership. Many have not received bulletins. We have had many complaints of people not receiving plans they paid for either! Bit of a joke really, so sad. Their organisation has now lost it's second web site and domain name, by failing to renew it....Lets see how they get on with their third attempt which at in February 03, still had 'Merry Christmas' on it! ( Though this has at last gone they have not updated the site, since Nov 03 and it appears now Jan 05, to have died. The pics are still wrong, the few they have....the scant information is wrong and the pages still don't work, hey ho...) July 05 the site is still static and pages inoperable, the same dozen photos, most with incorrect titles are still the only ones they have... Such is their interest in Y.M. boats. The latest silliness to come out from them is that we have magically managed to place an 'unknown, untraceable, special virus' on Mr. Jones' computer that prevented him doing anything to their website for 9 months. Wow, that we were that clever.! The stupid sort of lies that they spin to try and demean us. I wonder what fantastic excuse they will think up for their latest site problems. It has had serious errors on it, that we informed them of on day one, that are still uncorrected! It also had my photos on it, which is OK, but I would like the courtesy of an acknowledgement. The lengths go to, why cannot they simply admit they have a finger problem? Why blame others for their own inabilities? Mr Jones has since admitted he has no such virus and he simply is unable to cope with a website. Something we were well aware of 18 months ago. As far as we can see they have also lost most of their members, why? We believe it is simple, the vast majority of owners cannot accept that 'non owners' should be at the head of the eoa. It is simple to see the result, an inactive club with a dead website, no real interest.... See the letters page. Some would say 'why are they in it at all'? I can see that ex owners might like to stay with friends they had made, to sail in company or generally socialise, this we applaud, but surely they should lead by example?? We tried to bring the rules into line with most other assocs. and have an associate membership, which the membership at large approved, but the motion was defeated when the committee ganged up on the members and pulled every dirty trick in the book to win. Ex members without boats, magically appeared as members at that agm to outvote the owners... family were joined as members at the door... The eoa was doomed. The antics of the committee were so reprehensible, that all witnessing them, from all sides of the argument, were genuinely shocked. At that stage I would have simply walked away, as a lot did, but the president went one further, he sent a libellous letter out to 100 plus of my friends and acquaintances!. In it he accused me of being a thief! Me!! It took 10 months to get him to admit he lied! Ten months of calls, (soon gave up on that), letters and eventually solicitors letters. At one stage I was convinced he had taken leave of his senses. He refused to resign and instead convinced the other committee members to assist him in expelling me from the eoa, without recourse to the rules, just to shut me up, no hearing, as required by their rules, no just a letter. At this stage I do not think he had revealed to them that he had lied!!! They were all duped. I was gone anyway by this time, as were most members who had heard them at that rude agm. Their agm was witnessed by two retired fellow senior police officers, a man who is now a Justice of the Peace, a senior District Councillor and of course, many owners, strong and true. They will all tell you the same story. The eoa died that night, at their hands. The non owners on the committee, (who still seem to think they are right to run it and cannot see why owner-members are so irate), still backed the man, now even after knowing he lied!. Will the last one to leave please turn out the light! The really sad thing about all this is all the effort that many of us, and not any of them, have put in to get them where they were and it will be all lost because of the actions of this committee. Now of course, we really can expect them to now blame the owners for all this, why not. It must be our fault, we own the boats, or something like that.... How really pathetic. I found it particularly sad that so many, fully realising they had been duped, had not the backbone to stand up and ask serious questions of those that lied. Their inaction was as bad, if not worse, than the original lies. Some of these people had purported to be my friends, eaten at my table and slept under my roof, they did not even bother to ask me what was going on... some friends. None of them will ever be welcome within this group! *******************************************************
February 2018. Sadly we have now had it confirmed that the former eoa has folded. We had heard rumours for well over a year, but it has now been confirmed. We heard first from Yachting Monthly, then from another owners group and it has now been confirmed. Sad they did not make it to the 55th anniversary. We were approached a couple of years back and asked if we would like to BUY their assets! We declined, as these were donated to the owners and if we paid the old assoc. for them, we had grave doubts as to who would pocket the proceeds. We did offer for them to join us and share our success, sadly they chose not to respond. We said it was only a matter of time. If the people running a group are not committed enough to actually own the boats, it was just bound to happen. 2020 we learn the remaining few had a private meeting and took home the silverware. Plus the other items they held. A paltry £200 was donated to charity, so they say. Was that their idea of honesty?? John
2021. By Chance I saw the bound copies of YM, signed by MG, that were donated to me for the association appear in eBay! surprise surprise.
The were offered by Mr. Leaper, the last one standing.. I bought them! Criminal that he could sell them. He admitted to me he had retained the Silver MG plate, but refused to pass or sell it to me. Refused to say where the other items went... Doubt we will ever see that or the other trophies ever again.
There was a large model Eventide 24, inch to the foot, in a Perspex case, I was given that in two shoe boxes by YM after it was damaged at the Southampton Boat show, when a gale struck the marquee in the 1970's. I repaired it and fitted the cover.. It was often on the table at AGM's. A nice bronze belaying pin, that was mounted with an engraved plate. this was given to me by Maurice as a trophy, it came from one of his favourite boats, 'Solani'. A silver cup, a silver plated rose bowl and a donated shield, awarded to the winner of the little friendly race we held every year at Bradwell. Most had additional hardwood plinths with silver bands engraved with the winners details. All of these have vanished.
************************************** Click here to find out What went wrong with the old assoc.
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So where does that
leave us now.???
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Well, we have officially launched a new group, we are the 'Eventiders' or the 'Eventide Owners Group'. Run by owners and friends, for other owners or interested people. We have all the advisors and now the majority of the members from the old eoa on side. We have a group of 'Trustees' and of course the advisors, and we take real notice of suggestions from contributors. No one is looking to be 'El supremo' or any other rank, we are enthusiasts, who for the most part actually own these boats, and boats by the same designers. We have ex owners in our group too, and welcome they are, but they are not telling us how to act with or without our boats! We meet socially and for sailing meets, and freely exchange information and views. We are internet based, opening this site on 9th February 2003, (but for those not on line we once offered a simple printout of the site and newsletter, for the cost of 12 first class stamps. We realise that many now have access through libraries of course, so the number or members offline is falling as they get connected... December 2006 we have stopped sending Newsletters by post, for one thing the post has gone up, for another our Newsletters were getting far to big! Another reason is that was have now heard from all but one of those who asked for them to be mailed, and they are now able to access the website on line.)
We intend to publish as much information as we can to help builders or restorers. If you have pictures or logs, we will print them, if you have a view, express it freely on our guest pages and new Forum! The eoa president forbade that! Their guest page is static. They requested that we remove the plans sec. address, so you will find it very difficult to find them to buy a set of the plans. They actually accused us of selling the plans?? We don't have them... Or do we? Most of us are owners, many built their own from plans they still possess. There is nothing in law that says we cannot lend out sets of drawings out to others wanting them, is there! We are not copying them, nor making profit from them, they are ours, to let anyone who wishes have a look. So that's what we do! So far we have helped several owners repair their craft, we hope to help more. I initially personally sponsored this web space to publish details of our boats and share information with those who want to learn more, as requested, after that agm of the old eoa, in 2003, when the members who attended and were so disgusted with the proceedings. We all walked out, when the meeting was closed to prevent members asking questions in AO.B! Since then many more have come forward to donate boat bits etc to pay for the site and at the moment it is not costing me anything but time and effort. This I have always been willing to do. I like helping others, their thanks is my reward, I need no accolade or rank! We have sufficient funds to expand the site and to continue for at least a further three years. Many members of the old eoa have now donated their written work and photos so they may be published here. We have also the promise of larger donations in the future and the support of many organisations, including the yachting press! We are too large a group now, to be dismissed! In July 2004 we learnt that almost all of the 2003/4 eoa committee have either sold or are selling their boats, (Even if the only Eventide owner left there will not admit it, we found the advert, on a friends site, so he is selling his too!) leaving just 2 sailing Y.M. boats they own and one building. We will not count the 'token' Seniors, the 'wrecks on trailers', to be moved from officer to officer when needed! Yes it's true, that's what they proposed to do and then actually did!! That, we felt was an insult. The non owners are firmly in control of what was once a thriving owners association, where do they go from there? Most we have spoken to have a similar opinion, DOWN! In a recent bulletin that a few received, (but most threw away!!) We learn that they now claim the RYA directed them to dismiss those of us they did?? Bet the RYA did not tell them to break the rules, I wonder if the RYA are aware they are implicated in that! (and before they say otherwise, the rules could not be changed without an agm vote, which of course they never had!) We also learn from this communication that they believe the civil law of the country to be wrong. Well sir, wrong or not it is the law, just like the criminal law is, defy it at your peril. I will agree there is no profit to be had, except by lawyers, but if an individual refuses to admit a blatant published lie and say sorry, (No I never ever got an apology sent to me!), there is no other way but to use the law of the land. Yes it could have been settled in a trice, all he had to do was answer one of the dozens of communications from me with an OOpps., sorry! That would have done, but no, what a wally. I will be the first to admit I make mistakes, the man who does not, is the man who does nothing, that is not me. Incidentally had the writ been served, as it was to have been a day or two later, after the eventual admission of guilt was received, they would have found out that I had signed over all damages I might have received as a result, to the eoa!!! Now tell me I intended to harm the eoa!?!? I had spent most of my life helping others and the eoa, I had sponsored it with enough of my money over the years, as well they knew, my wish was to ensure it continued, at the wish of the owners, as the owners association it was supposed to be. How they misjudged me....
AT NO POINT DID I SUE THE EOA, THEY WERE NOT MENTIONED ON THE WRIT!! If Menamin told them otherwise, then more fool them for believing a man who proved to be a liar. He spent 10 months trying to hide behind the eoa, blaming others for his own actions. I know they had nothing to do with his letter, but sadly many of them, having dug such a large hole they were unable to climb out, sided with him and have lost all credence with virtually any sane owner. John Williams. July 2005, over 290 owners and 'friends' have given their support. May 2006, nearly 400! December 2006, over 470! September 2008, over 725, and still growing! January 2015 we are well over 1500!!! 2022, 1700. We thrive, they have faded away! February 2018 they are no more. They have closed their membership. We had just had our 1650th member join, say something? You cannot expect a group or organisation to survive if those who continue to run it are not even committed enough to actually own the boats themselves... John
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| Welcome to the latest edition of the Eventiders web site. | |
| What has changed and why. This site is the owner's response to the fiasco at the agm of the eoa in January 2003. The owners present asked us to reinstate a good site after the old site was interfered with and degraded by Jones's tinkering. Eventually I, the webmaster, ( Barry), removed my 'Intellectual Property Rights', as I told them I would do, if they altered or interfered with my work. I gave them several months in which to replace my design with their own, they did not, instead Jones substituted his name on some documents, claiming them as his work! Disgraceful conduct! They further destroyed the site till it failed to work. John Williams removed permission for the further use any of his words. John's photographs were 'lost' by Jones, they still have not been returned, a problem that many owners are having with them.. John then withdrew his support for the committee after it refused to take any heed of it's membership. Some owners have complained to us that having paid for bulletins they never got them, see the letters page for more. Some have never received plans they paid for, what a mess! John's articles are not being used by them, instead you will find them and a lot more, here! Now many other ex eoa members have given the rights to their words to us, so we can reproduce them for you. Screen Resolution. Every effort has been made ensure you do not have to scroll pages from side to side (rather than from top to bottom) if you do need to scroll from side to side it may be worth altering your screen size to 800x600, or above. This can be done in Control Panel. This will allow more of the page (in all programmes) to be seen on your screen albeit that everything will be a little smaller. Guest & For Sale Pages. The For Sale pages is now hosted on this site rather than being hosted by a third party. As most of you will be aware, we had major problems with the guest page when the company hosting it ceased to exist. We hope that hosting the For Sale pages on our own site will eliminate the problems we had with that. However in response to demand, we have started a new Forum. Although not on our site, we can save the information that is posted there, something we could not do in the past. There is no censorship on either forum or for sale page. What works and what doesn't. Now, 2005, the site should be fully working, however, some functions of the new site can only be tested (web counter, guest pages) can only be tested by uploading it to this location. Any errors will be rectified fairly quickly. Although we will check the site after uploading and will be aware of most errors, it would still be helpful if you could notify us of any errors or typos you notice. enquiries@eventides.org.uk I hope these solutions work well and are of use to you. Barry Sturrock Web Master We are saddened to announce that Barry Sturrock died April 19th 2005. His work continues and this site will be a memorial to his efforts.
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For those already afloat there is a continuing interest in progressing from the Coastal Cruising to 1st time foreign, even to circumnavigating the world, as recently undertaken in a Waterwitch. We will publish any logs sent to us as well. A group of us cruised to London the last two springs, and another group to Holland.
The East Coast section met once a month at the 'Bell' pub in Danbury, on the last Wednesday of the month at 2000hrs. Now we meet in various locations around Essex. Chat is about anything, and sometimes boats! Join us if you like a friendly crowd. Ring me or Doug to make sure we are not off sailing though! We shall be sailing all around the Thames Estuary again this year, see the events calendar.
Joining this group is free. We welcome all owners of any Y.M. designs, and to boats designed by the same designers. You can be associated to this group, simply by being interested. We objected to the eoa being run and headed by non owners, disinterested in the views of owners. John Williams.
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E-mail us at enquiries@eventides.org.uk
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