A long-term partnership between one of the oldest fishing clubs in the country and a historic library has been brought into the digital era.
Tavistock Subscription Library was donated books on fishing by the Tavy Walkham and Plym Fishing Club (TWPF) at a ceremony to mark the digitisation of the club’s records in the library.
Ian Parker, club chairman, donated books about fishing on the Tavy, Walkham and other local rivers to library chairman Simon Dell in a gesture of thanks to library volunteer Penny Gardiner in particular, and as part of the Tavistock Heritage Open Days.
The library has the original ledger in its archives which records the 1865 foundation of TWPF.
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Simon said it was a privilege for the library to work with TWPF to digitise their early history for online reading.
Ian said: “The club has recently been delighted to enter into a collaboration with the Tavistock Subscription Library to digitise the club’s archive of minute books and accounts dating back to 1865, in order to safeguard them for future generations.
“Early volumes comprise handwritten records in beautiful copperplate handwriting, which have been lovingly handed from one generation of the club’s committee to the next.
“The history of the club provides a fascinating insight into both societal changes and the various threats faced by our local rivers and the fish that swim within them over the years.”
Originally this included pollution from mines and poaching, but now climate change and sewage discharge is threatening migratory salmon and trout, salmon and sea trout.
The club was formed in response to the Salmon Fisheries Act of 1861 by the ‘great and the good’ of Tavistock to safeguard salmon in the rivers but also to make fishing available to local people at a reasonable price.
The digital files of the TWPFC books and records from 1864 to 1923 are now available for download by signed-in users of the Tavistock Subscription Library catalogue.
New users can obtain a free sign-in by completing the contact form on the catalogue home page at https://tavistocksublib.slls.online/. Once signed in, type ‘fishing’ into the search/subject field to find the TWPFC records.