Cyril J Wood has had an active interest in canals and inland waterways since a child when, in 1960, his parents hired a cabin cruiser from Dean's Pleasure Cruisers at Christleton on the Shropshire Union Canal before having their own boat built. Since then there has always been a canal boat in the family. Cyril's narrowboat "Total Eclipse" is moored at Lymm on the Bridgewater Canal.
Cyril is a qualified photographer and lecturer in photography. As well as being a prolific photographer and producing audio/visual presentations, to date he has had two books published... "The Duke's Cut - The Bridgewater Canal" (first and second editions) and "The Big Ditch - Manchester's Ship Canal" (first, second and now... third editions) both published by The History Press (formally Tempus Publishing).
In addition to these two works he has also written "Photography in One" an eBook covering the Theory, History and Practical aspects of analogue (wet) and digital photography, "Wyre Heal - A Local History of the Wirral Peninsula", "From Navy League to Wirral Met" - The History of Wirral Metropolitan College and its Campuses, a quintrilogy entitled "Canalscape" documenting fifty years of canal cruising which also includes many additions such as "Don't Call It A Barge" and the History of Lymm Cruising Club The non-canal section - "Diarama" includes "Wyre Heal" - a local history of the Wirral Peninsula, "Flying Bridges" - A Short History of the Transporter Bridge, "Steel Pins to MP3" - A Short History of Sound Recording and Reproduction (all in eBook format). Cyril has also had many articles published in magazines on subjects ranging from photography, ciné & video, audio/visual and Wirral's local history to canals and inland waterways. Most of these subjects are featured on his website which can be found at www.canalscape.net.
Cyril has also had involvement with other forms of media as well as photography and the written word. He is Radio Merseyside's canals and inland waterways correspondent and has been involved in many programmes for the station. He was also contacted by researchers from BBC's television series "What The Industrial Revolution Did For Us" regarding locations for the episode that concentrated on canals and "The Duke's Cut" was extensively used for research during the programme. He was interviewed by John Craven on the BBC's "Countryfile" programme when they produced a feature on the Manchester Ship Canal. The content was repeated in the BBC's "Country Tracks" series. Most of the archive photographs used in the programmes were from "The Big Ditch" as well as facts and other information contained within the book. Cyril was again approached by the BBC in 2011 to be included in their Webwise "Tales from the Manchester Ship Canal". A camera crew followed him for a day taking photographs on location and then at his home filming what happens to his photographs once taken before uplooading them to his canalscape.net website.
Cyril is currently working on "Mersey Connections - Navigable Waterways and Docks Connected to the River Mersey" and converting some of his manuscripts into Kindle eBook format.
Biography written by Simon Wilson
