UNDER THE NEVER-CEASING INFLUENCE of current and tidal stream, the coastline of our islands quietly moulds its contours to the pattern of the sea. Equally, our seaboard towns and villages reflect in their industries, population and way of life the restless pressure of economic and social change. Old ways pass into reminiscence and dream; new ways break upon the scene with all the vigour and enthusiasm of youth.

To fulfil its purpose, the RNL1 needs to be sensitive to, and ready to meet, the changing patterns of seafaring around the coast. There may come a time when the fire of lifeboat activity may die down in one locality; it may later be rekindled, but with different fuel.

Take, for instance, North Berwick on the south shore of the Firth of Forth.

Here is a station which has seen much change. Closed in 1925 after 65 years' service, as coastal traffic diminished, it sprang to life again in 1967 as a busy inshore lifeboat station, full of vitality.

North Berwick is a little town only half-an-hour's journey from Edinburgh.

A single-line railway track leading down to it runs between fields and rocky cuttings splashed with the yellow of whin. Hares and grouse move off the line, without overdue haste, out of the path of the infrequent train.

Coming down to the shore, the first impression is of a rugged coastline, with rocks jutting out into little headlands dividing the harbour entrance from East and Milsey Bays; with rocky islets offshore overshadowed by the impressive white-capped pyramid of Bass Rock rising out of the sea to the north east. There is a sweep of beach westward of the harbour, but once again rocks border its far end. Even on a quiet day the water round the rocks moves with the turbulence of restrained energy ready to break out in anger once aroused by rising wind.

Down by the harbour, the building which immediately commands attention is the East Lothian Yacht Club, housed in a tall old granary; a memorial to past sea trade, it is still very much at the heart of the seaboard life of the town. Commodore of the club, Alexander Auld, is one of the 'founder' members of the ILB crew. Fishing, lifeboat and sailing people meet in happy community in the beamed rooms where once agricultural commodities waited to be loaded on to small sailing coastal ships; potatoes and grain from the fertile hinterland (it is said thatCromwell's troops declared East Lothian oats to be the best they had foraged anywhere on their campaigns); guano, too, from Bass Rock.

There was a busy inshore fishing fleet in those days as well, and it was fishermen who manned the seven pulling and sailing lifeboats stationed at North Berwick from the time the station was established in 1860 until its closure in 1925. During those years the lifeboats launched on service 37 times and saved 64 lives.

Standing by the modern ILB whose maintenance is his pride, Tom Brown will tell you of the Marrs, the Browns, the Millers, the Thompsons and the Thorburns, all fishing families who in the old days lived in cottages alongside the harbour; he will tell you of how, when the lifeboat was launched from the old boathouse further up the street, the boat on her carriage was eased down the slipway by manning drag ropes; of how on one occasion the lifeboat came back from service black with tar, so that it took the womenfolk (who were always there to help with launching and recovery) nearly two days to clean her, using margarine; of how, as a boy, he used to collect the lifejackets from the crew as they came ashore, to take them up to the boathouse.

By the 1920's the pattern had changed.

There had been a decline in small coastal shipping and in fishing; there were to be motor lifeboats at Dunbar and Anstruther able, with their wider operational range, to watch over the approaches to the Forth. North Berwick station was closed.

Life went on, and North Berwick became more and more popular as a resort for holidays and, in the postsecond world war years, for sailing.

Now the town's population increases by something like three times in the summer months, and by even more at the weekends.

There are still lobster fishing boats, but, in addition, there are the boats based on the yacht club, fleets of dinghies which meet to sail their championships on the waters of the Forth, and yachts on passage. There are bathers, too, and people climbing the rocks, exploring cliffs.

Aware of the new situation, after the introduction of inshore lifeboats into its fleet in 1963—a revolution made possible by the development of inflatable boat and outboard engine—the RNLI offered to station an ILB at North Berwick. A meeting was called in May 1966 between representatives of the Institution and the town to discuss the practical problems involved, and in July 1967 this new station became operational.

There had been a missed generation; a generation of boats, with the successiongoing straight from the old pulling and sailing boats to the modern inflatable, and a generation of men. But the tinder had been kept dry; those men who would have been the crews in the intervening years were there to offer the knowledge on which the reopened station could be built and the experience for its administration.

The first honorary secretary of the ILB station was J. A. Stewart, who was concerned in publishing. He was followed by Lieut.-Commander J. D.

Tweedie, RNVR, a sheep farmer with extensive ranching interests in South America. The present honorary secretary is Findlay Cessford, QBE, whoselife has been concerned with the sea.

William Dunn, a lobster fisherman, has been deputy launching authority since 1967. Backing up on shore are Ben Miller, Tom Brown and a whole group of experienced seamen.

On the water, there is a new generation of boat and man. There have, so far, been two D class ILBs stationed at North Berwick, first a 15' 6" Zodiac followed six years later by a 16' RFD.

Both were provided by the enterprise of the young, for their cost came from funds raised by the sale of paperback books collected by viewers of the BBC programme 'Blue Peter'. Easy to launch, capable, with powerful outboard engines, of more than 20 knots, eminently seaworthy within their range of action, manoeuvrable and able to work in shoal waters and among rocks, these new rescue boats and all they meant caught the imagination of children all over the country; through 'Blue Peter' enough money was raised to pay for ILBs at four RNLI stations. Each of the two North Berwick boats has been named Blue Peter III.

These modern inflatable boats are just the tool for the job they have to do, but in them the crew are as exposed as they would have been in the old pulling and sailing boats, and the stresses imposed by an inflatable driven at high speed through rough water call for the resilience of a younger man; for the ILB crews, therefore, the upper age limit is set at 45. On the first North Berwick TLB crew list in 1967 there was a good proportion of men in their early twenties, and the average age is now about 29.

North Berwick is a summer station, operational from April 1 to the end of October, and every Sunday morning throughout that period the crew are out on exercise. A progressive programme is planned. Like all RNLI inshore lifeboats, Blue Peter III is fitted with a VHP radiotelephone, so there will be practice with Coastguard Fifeness, Divisional Rescue HQ; then seamanship exercises, progressing from simple to advanced manoeuvres; another week there will be an exercise with a helicopter; then practice in dealing with a capsizeddinghy; or lifting a survivor out of the water. Each week skills are polished, muscles flexed, familiarity with boat and equipment deepened, so that, when a call comes, boat and crew are at the peak of preparedness. Since 1967 there have been 49 launches on service and 37 lives saved, as well as 12 vessels brought back safely.

Two bronze medals for gallantry were awarded to North Berwick crew members in 1973; Benjamin Pearson and Alexander Russell. It was for the rescue of a man who had got into difficulties while trying to help a bather seen to be in trouble in East Bay one July afternoon.

The thanks of the Institution inscribed on vellum were also accorded to James Pearson who embarked to give extra stability and a further pair of hands for hauling casualties aboard, when, having landed the man, the ILB went out a second time to look (unfortunately without avail) for two other people who had joined in the original rescue attempt. It was a service carried out close to rocks in surf and very heavy swell reported from on shore to be at least 15' from trough to crest. All three crew members had served since the reopening of the station in 1967; all three are fishermen; and all three were awarded 'Blue Peter's' gold badge, its highest award, with which they were presented during a transmission of the programme the following December.

This medal service was reported in full in the spring 1974 issue of THE LIFEBOAT; in the winter 1974/75 issue a photograph was also published of aservice on May 26, 1974, when Blue Peter III helped in the helicopter rescue of an injured boy who had fallen over a cliff. On that occasion the crew who took part when John Graham Thorburn, James Dixon and James Pearson.

When the maroons go up all members of the crew make for the boathouse. The first two to arrive form the crew for that service, the more experienced man taking command. All are, in fact, capable of acting as helmsman. At times, if the nature of the service demands it, the boat will be crewed by three.

Senior helmsman, also taking responsibility in the administration of the station, is John Graham Thorburn, a plumber by trade. Among the remainder of the crew are fishermen, a joiner, an electrician, a farmer, an apprentice engineer, a driver/serviceman, a teacher, a marine engineer, a turner and a landscape gardener. Between them they can provide all the skills needed to deal with day-by-day running repairs of boat and boathouse; Tom Brown takes responsibility for the maintenance of the boat, and William Dunn for the outboard engine.

There is strong community backing for the station. Not only is the branch financially self-sufficient but local people also take an active interest. For instance, many houses along the front display cards saying that their telephones are available for 999 calls to the Coastguard; this was the result of a safety scheme actively pursued by the then Burgh Council, alas, no longer in existence. During the winter crew members attend first-aid courses at the South of Scotland Fire Service School, a few miles away, and the Coastguard provide facilities for RT exercise in winter, too.

Links are close with the Police, Red Cross and Coastguard. Several members of the station are Auxiliary Coastguards, taking their turn to watch over their waters from the lookout point on Plattcock End, the promontory north of the harbour.

In the best tradition of the lifeboat service, the ILB station is an integral part of the life of North Berwick..