Page 50 - South Issue 12

50
Blue Plaque
Samuel Edgar Saunders
Location of Plaque
Streatley
Samuel
Edgar Saunders
was a local man born in 1857
at The Swan in Streatley. His father was
the innkeeper at the pub and Samuel was raised in
the town, which has a strong association with the
river Thames. As a child, he would doubtless have
learnt
how to row a
boat and it was in his teens
that he started to develop his love of all
things nautical and decided to start building boats.
His engineering skills, as well as his business skills,
developed quickly and in Edwardian Britain, the rich
had recently adopted messing around on the river as
its favourite leisure pursuit. His keen eye for business
noticed this and instead of sticking to building one
type of boat, he tried his hand at making crafts of
all different kinds to feed the diverse market. The