Fishing boats were given names ranging from the poetic: Roving Swan, Guiding Star, Full Moon, Flying Scud, through various Bees: Wild Bee, Honey Bee, Buzzing Bee, Busy Bee, and it is probably the wave teetotalism spread by the temperance missionary James Teare in the mid 19th century which accounts for: Blue Jacket, Good Templar and Rechabite. But as to the origin of Can Can, was this some sort of backlash reaction to temperance?
Between 1847 and 1898 the Teare and Sons family had shares in some 24 fishing smacks. They frequently traded shares both within the family and with others in Peel and the Isle of Man and rarely owned a boat in its entirety or for its total life. This makes following ownership very complex as a few examples below demonstrate.
Gannet : smack with mizzen built Peel 1835
Trading records show that in 1847 John Teare, a Peel roper, brought 16 shares in Gannet from John Noy, a Peel fisherman. Then the following year he sold them back to John Noy, now listed as a Douglas publican. If that wasn’t complicated enough in 1849 John Noy sold the shares to Henry Teare, a Peel ropemaker and this is certainly John’s father. Gannet had Teare shareholding between 1847 and 1868 and was eventually sold to Port St Mary.
Willow Grove : smack with mizen built Peel 1843
In 1855 John Teare brought 8 shares in Willow Grove from Jane Cowll a Liverpool spinster. Willow Grove was originally owned by Thomas Cowll (fisherman), Thomas Cowll (carpenter) together with James Bowman (rope maker), Robert Keown (sumner), Henry Cowll (schoolmaster) and Jane Cowll . There was Teare shareholding until 1868 and she was eventually either broken up or sold to Ballyherbert, Ireland as there are 2 records for the same official number but recording different outcomes.
Bee Hive : 2 masted smack with mizen built Peel 1861
Bee Hive built in Peel in 1861 had share ownership by the Teare family from 1861 until she was lost at Southend near Campbelltown on 6 September 1899. But the ownership is complex. John Teare was an original owner in 1861 with 16/64 shares along with Charles Morrison (merchant), Henry Graves (merchant), Thomas Corris (mariner) and Robert Corrin (shipowner). In 1878 the original owners sold all their 64 shares to John Keggin a master mariner in Port Erin. In the same year he in turn traded them to Hugh Flinn a fish merchant from Co Wicklow and then John Teare purchased 32 shares back from him. In 1879 John Teare jnr brought the other 32 shares from Hugh Flinn and immediately traded 8 shares to each of John Gregor (Peel Master Mariner) and Robert Harrison (Peel wine and spirit merchant). The next year in 1880 Thomas Henry Davis and William Bruce Johnston both Peel Chemical Manufacturer acquired all the shares from the various owners only for John Teare jnr to re-acquire them all back in 1881. There was 6 years of stability with John Teare jnr as owner until 1887 when John Teare jnrs brothers, William Edward and Henry, jointly brought all 64 shares from John jnr and Bee Hive continued with that ownership until she was lost in 1898