Lifeboat stations around the coast are subject to immense wear and tear from the launch and recovery of lifeboats and exposure to the elements. If lifeboats are to remain operational their boathouses and slipways must, however, be kept in a good state of repair. In the 1950s, one of the people responsible for this was Vic Treneary (pictured). His job took him around the coast of the British Isles, employing gangs of men at each location to repair, reinforce and repaint the lifeboat stations.

Vic is now retired and lives with his wife, Joan, in Devon. Their settled life today is a far cry from the first five years of their marriage. After their wedding, Joan joined Vic in their caravan, which he towed using a Land Rover. 'I must have clocked up thousands of miles in that caravan. It was a very, very interesting life,' says Vic. The well-travelled pair took the caravan to lifeboat stations as far apart asThurso in the north of Scotland, Moelfre in north Wales and Sennen Cove on the south west tip of England.

They even left their beloved mobile home behind sometimes and took ferries to Ireland, where Vic worked on lifeboat stations at both Kilmore Quay in County Wexford and Wicklow.

Many of the gang workers were lifeboat crew members who earned their crust from fishing and they would eagerly await Vic's arrival.

'I gave them employment through the winter when they were not fishing as much,' he explains. 'They were always hard workers.' Vic and Joan spent six weeks or more at each station. Joan says she never got bored while Vic was working. 'I thoroughly enjoyed it. I would never have seen so much of the country if it wasn't for Vic,' she adds.

The foundations of Vic's involvement with the RNLI can be traced back through his family: his grandfather was a construction worker for the charity in the early 1900s. Vic's father was later employed as foreman of works, which encouraged Vic - originally a carpenter by trade - to take a job himself. 'I think that knowing my grandfather had done work for the RNLI may have influenced me joining. I was brought up on the Isles of Scilly, where lifeboats were part of your life,' he reflects.

After five years of marriage Vic and Joan had a daughter and, when she reached school age, Vic changed jobs. 'I joined a firm that did not need me to travel, but I never felt I'd left the RNLI,' explains Vic.His expertise was still called on by the charity from time to time until, eventually, he was asked to return full time to a permanent job that did not involve as much travel as before. 'We had two daughters by then who were older and I was delighted to accept,' he says.

Vic's new role saw him based in the south west of England and he began constructing replacement stations as well as maintaining existing ones. This cemented his bond with the lifeboat crews and station personnel in Cornwall and Devon.

7 would get a phone call at home at night, get dressed and leave for The Lizard, or somewhere like that, because the boathouse doors had been damaged. I'm not blowing my •umpet but I pro! On another occasion, Vic was in Cornwall when he got a phone call asking him to travel to llfracombe in north Devon as soon as possible: the lifeboat had damaged the side of the boathouse. Vic drove there immediately and set about hiring a crane to help repair the damage. 'I've never put a lifeboat off service,' says Vic. 'We always had a temporary measure in place while we worked, so that the lifeboat could still launch.'The demand for Vic's services meant that Joan was often taking phone calls for him at home while he was working elsewhere. 'I thoroughly enjoyed it,' she says. 'We were a team - I eventually got a wage myself because I pretty much became his secretary.' By the time Vic retired in 1992, the current RNLI Shoreworks Manager, Howard Richings, had been with the charity for three years. Vic knew his job inside out and was a real craftsman,' says Howard. 'He always had a great relationship with the lifeboat stations.' In 2005 Vic visited Padstow, Cornwall, where a new boathouse and slipway is under construction to replace the old lifeboat station - a building that Vic helped construct in the late 1960s. The new structure is designed to house a Tamar class all weather lifeboat (look out for full details of the Padstow lifeboat station and its funding in a future issue of the Lifeboat).

Vic has maintained the relationships he built up with lifeboat stations and their volunteers and remains part of the RNLI family.

He states proudly that, ever since he retired, he has drunk coffee from his RNLI mug every day. 'My occupation was one that you cannot define,' he says. 'And I only ever had one regret - retiring.'.