Former lighthouse keepers Barry Hawkins and Jack Hayes

Keeping Watch

Welcome to KEEPING WATCH - a fortnightly podcast for anyone and everyone interested in lighthouses, lighthouse keepers, light vessels and other aids to maritime navigation.

In this final episode of Season 1, we meet two former lighthouse keepers - Barry Hawkins, who served at many of the best known lighthouses in Wales and the South West of England between 1980 and 1997 - including Wolf Rock, the Skerries and St Anns Head. And Jack Hayes, whose career with Trinity House started shortly after the war, and included terms at Souter Point, Longships, Round Island, the Nab Tower, Orfordness and Bishop Rock.

His recordings form a unique and personal archive of film footage and audio recordings that together illustrate the nature of the work and the life of a lighthouse keeper.

We also listen to an extract from a wonderful interview Peter made with Sid Squib, who served as a keeper on the Nab tower before and during the war.

Barry Hawkins' website: https://www.lighthouseart.co.uk/

Peter's YouTube channel:https://www.youtube.com/@PeterHalil

Peter’s full interview with Jack Hayes was captured on film, and is almost an hour long: https://youtu.be/C8G0hr1EvCc

Jack Hayes in Anglia Television documentary c.1960: https://eafa.ehost.uea.ac.uk/work/?id=892150®enerate=true

That’s it for the first season of Keeping Watch. We’ll be back with another 12 episodes after a short break - Look out for season 2 at the beginning of May.

Until then, do please spread the word to friends and family who might be interested in listening. And do subscribe or follow this podcast so that you are notified when we return. A comment or a splendid review on your podcast platform of choice would be very welcome and really helps us to get noticed.

If you have an idea for a story we could cover, or an interesting person with a lighthouse connection we might interview, do please drop me a line. Or perhaps you are a fellow enthusiast and would like to contribute to the podcast either once or on a regular basis?

You can contact me at [email protected].

KEEPING WATCH is brought to you in association with the ALK - The Association of Lighthouse Keepers - a charitable trust in the UK dedicated to keeping lighthouse heritage alive.

Visit the Association of Lighthouse Keepers: www.alk.org.uk