George Towns

George Towns learnt his boat building skills while staying with Emily's family working with Edward King building the keel for the "Australian Soveriegn" & probably the the "Hariet King". 1869/70 George & Emily moved to Dempsey Island to begin a farm, orchard & dairy to raise thier growing family. He built a boat to transport his produce to the markets, it was so sucessfull he began to get requests for other boats as transport on the river was problematic.

By the time a fire in July 1954 destroyed all the equipment & records it had involved most of his family. At this time they were under pressure from the government to buy back the land to accomodate the industrial complex known as Kooragang Island. The fire devastated the family, timber was hard to get & new materials were changing boat building.

During the war the Towns' built 259 boats & thousands of oars for the army, navy & air force.