Chappell, Reuben (1870-1940)

Was born 21. July 1870 in Doyle Street, Goole, as the youngest son of six children. Chappell was born near the port of Goole, so he was from an early age familiar with ships and sailors. He received a scholarship from the then privately owned Goole Grammar School and soon showed his talent for drawing the ships that had dominated his daily life since childhood. He became interested in photography and was apprenticed to a photographer Harrison, and coloring photographs led him to paint art. Except for a few lessons, he was self-taught.

From adolescence contributed Chappell with line drawings in the local newspapers, and his paintings of ships be known locally. From the twentieth age, he established a Studio on Jackson Street 7 in Goole, and he advertised in the Goole Times as photographer and artist. But he found out that by selling its portraits of ships to the Mariners, he was so busy caring of these, that he only had scarce time to photography.

When the ships arrived at the port, went down there to get bookings, Chappell outlined details of the ships which were to be painted, and then returned to his Studio to complete the work, either in watercolor or oil. He took five shillings for a watercolor and thirty shillings for a portrait in oil paints.

He married at the age of twenty-five with Caroline Bayford of Thorne, a less well known poet whose verses were published occasionally in the local newspapers. But Chappell. who suffered from bronchitis since childhood, was advised to seek a warmer climate than the cold and moist air in Goole.

Then in 1904 he travelled to Par in Cornwall, and there he lived with his family for the rest of his life and was a well-known figure on the Quays at Fowey, Par and Charlestown, usually dressed in a Norfolk regional costume, whatever the weather