Bassenthwaite Sailing Club

In 1951 two brothers, solicitors in a Workington practice, their wives and families, spent a seaside holiday on the Lleyn Peninsula in North Wales. They hired a 10ft rowing dinghy for the period and such was their pleasure in ‘messing about in boats’ they determined to start a sailing club on one of the lakes in West Cumberland on their return. From such domestic enjoyment Bassenthwaite Sailing Club was born. The brothers were Ieuan and Elwyn Banner Mendus who spent their boyhood by the sea in the Welsh port of Fishguard but had settled in Cumberland to indulge their main sport of rock climbing. Their wives, Valerie and Enid, shared their enthusiasm for the Fells but the advent of children dictated a recreation which could be shared by all the family.