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Nicholsons Guides


pomkitanner

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10 hours ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

Bradshaw's were apparently making maps of the inland waterways before they were publishing railway guides, so you might be able to test this out!

Here is one from 1830 for the Wey and Arun. They also published Canals & Navigable Rivers of England & Wales by Henry Rodolph de Salis, but the first edition came out in 1904, so outside your century.

Jen

That’s interesting. I see the 1904 guide is still readily available.....I might treat myself!

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32 minutes ago, booke23 said:

That’s interesting. I see the 1904 guide is still readily available.....I might treat myself!

People complain that Nicholson's guides go out of date. I can just imagine the potential for complaints using a 1904 Bradshaw's.

Quote

I needed a chemists near to the canal. Of the two in the guide, one had been demolished and is now under a retail park, the other wouldn't sell me any tincture of opium, or arsenic crystals. Completely useless!

Jen

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33 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

People complain that Nicholson's guides go out of date. I can just imagine the potential for complaints using a 1904 Bradshaw's.

Jen

I suspect they don't go out of date as quickly as road atlases, they are even published with the year in large print on the front.   Any details which change are easily annotated unlike on a road map.

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On 06/08/2020 at 02:22, pomkitanner said:

I am considering buying the  guide for 4 counties ring to be used next year .  Have read the various reviews on the Amazon site , with some being quite negative on the coverage . Specifically that a lot was devoted to the wider area , to the detriment of information pertaining to the canal itself.  I already possess a copy for the GU, & Oxford, 2009 print, and found it very useful on 2 previous trips. Be interested if other members have any views on the current edition . Thanks

If your hiring a boat the company will have copies of Pearsons & Nicholsons available for sale.  I suggest you have a look on Ebay also.

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  • 1 month later...

CanalBookShop has the widest selection of canal books and guides in Britain, and we've been selling them for 10 years or more.  We post anywhere in the world.  But we have the same problem at the moment - several Nicholsons guides have been out of print for quite a while; currently, four are awaited.  Check our website at https://canalbookshop.co.uk/nicholsons.html for the latest availability.

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On 28/08/2020 at 19:11, cuthound said:

 

Yes, I still use those for planning the day ahead. I like the locks and miles between points, which was lost in later editions.

 

The spiral binding was the only improvement of the later editions.

Yes I miss the mileage notes. My oldest ones have every milepost marked, which is great, and I have taken to marking them on my newer ones as we pass them.

 

The spiral binding wasn't an improvement for me. My dashboard has a slot in it to take a Nicholson's, but the spiral binding won't fit. Hence I am still using the older ones, even though I do have more recent ones on the shelf.

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On 28/08/2020 at 14:18, booke23 said:

Not at all. I dare say a canal guide from the 1800's (if such a thing exists) would be good enough for navigation.

The New Oarsman's Guide to the Rivers and Canals of Great Britain and Ireland is probably the earliest leisure canal guide, and dates from the 1890s. (There's an earlier Oarsman's Guide but I believe it's mostly rivers. The 1904 Bradshaws is intended more as a commercial navigation guide than a leisure guide.)

 

There's a copy on Abebooks currently for £188. I do have a copy and I'll scan it when that accursed Chinese book scanner I backed on Indiegogo finally turns up...

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On 06/08/2020 at 02:22, pomkitanner said:

I am considering buying the  guide for 4 counties ring to be used next year .  Have read the various reviews on the Amazon site , with some being quite negative on the coverage . Specifically that a lot was devoted to the wider area , to the detriment of information pertaining to the canal itself.  I already possess a copy for the GU, & Oxford, 2009 print, and found it very useful on 2 previous trips. Be interested if other members have any views on the current edition . Thanks

Used 2 copies last week 2008 and latest, and old Pearson’s too.  They all vary.  How did the working boater ever manage?  I also always print an itinerary out from Nick Atty”s excellent ac canal planner before a trip on a new cut

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5 hours ago, Richard Fairhurst said:

The New Oarsman's Guide to the Rivers and Canals of Great Britain and Ireland is probably the earliest leisure canal guide, and dates from the 1890s. (There's an earlier Oarsman's Guide but I believe it's mostly rivers. The 1904 Bradshaws is intended more as a commercial navigation guide than a leisure guide.)

 

There's a copy on Abebooks currently for £188. I do have a copy and I'll scan it when that accursed Chinese book scanner I backed on Indiegogo finally turns up...

 

I hadn't heard of 'New Oarsman's Guide to the Rivers and Canals of Great Britain and Ireland'. It sounds very interesting. I did buy the modern reprint of the 1904 Bradshaw's recently, and I'd agree it is a commercial guide consisting mainly of mileage tables with only brief descriptions of each canal.

 

However I am currently enjoying the chapter entitled 'Appliances For Overcoming Changes of Level', which describes lock types and the various inclined planes/lifts, some of which had been out of use and dismantled for quite some time even in 1904.

 

I hope that scanner arrives some day!

Edited by booke23
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