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Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey

Dave Graham

Dave belongs to: Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade

Dave works for a marine engineering company. Before this he worked in the merchant navy as an engineer. He joined the Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade in 1991.

Dave was interviewed by Carl Greenwood on 15 December 2005. The interview took place at the Interviewee's kitchen and lasted 37 minutes and 44 seconds.

Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey
Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey

What does the sea mean to you?

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"What does the sea mean to me? I went to sea in my 20s when we had a British Merchant fleet- it was, it was different, it was exciting. You went to foreign places"

What does the sea mean to me? I went to sea in my 20s when we had a British Merchant fleet- it was, it was different, it was exciting. You went to foreign places. You went places that you, you wouldn’t go to. I mean I’m going back thirty years now, you went on holiday to Blackpool and Clacton- I was joining ships and going to Vancouver, San Francisco, Panama, Brazil, New Zealand, Australia, you know- places like that, and yes, it was different. It was not my intention ever to go to sea, I was going to be a power station engineer, but when I finished serving my time as an engineer there were no vacancies and I went to sea as a stop gap, and 12 years later I gave up. It was good- I enjoyed it. You never remember the bad times. You never remember the 14 hour shifts inside bloody Doxford crank cases button end bolts and things like that. You remember the good times on the road; the Rio carnival, all this sort of thing. You don’t remember the, getting paid off because you’ve got dermatitis, and blokes getting injured, people loosing their fingers and things. You don’t, they, you forget about things like that. But as I said earlier, I have a very healthy respect for what the sea is capable of doing and it amazes me that people are not aware of what the sea can do.

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This memory has these themes:
Adventure | Change | Lifestyles | Travel | Work

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