A "glamourous" floating nightclub remembered for its disco dancefloor and "hilarious" ticketed events welcomed Liverpool clubbers for over a decade.
Moored in Salthouse Dock, the Clubship Landfall nightclub was originally a converted tank landing craft LCT 7074 that started life in 1944 and took part in the D-Day landings in June that year. Two years later, it became the floating home of the Master Mariners’ Association of Liverpool in 1946.
But by the late 1960s, the venue took on a completely new life when business partners George 'Jud' Evans and Colin Peers bought it and transformed it into a popular nightlife venue. Clubbers would come onboard and walk through a hatch-like door to lower levels where they could grab a drink from the bar or head to the colourful dancefloor that lit up from underneath.
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George's daughter, Freja Evans Swogger, 57, grew up in Halewood and said her late dad and Colin's catering business, Compass Catering, is how the pair first got involved with the Landfall, before buying it in 1968. She told the ECHO: "The Master Mariners Club were there for several years.
"My dad went into partnership with Colin Peers who was a trained chef and initially I think they just had the catering contract for the place. As they did the catering they saw the clientele were very elderly and it was a somewhat run down gentleman's club and I think they looked at it and thought we could make a nightclub out of this its a great venue, it needs a fresh injection of energy into it and we could really make a run at it."
Along with her siblings Leif, Bjorn, Sven and Kirsti, most of Freja's childhood Saturdays were spent treating the ship like their own "personal playground." Freja also remembers staff members like caretaker Kelvin and the Landfall having a "nasty parrot" that they weren't allowed to go near.
She said: "We’d all go down there as I guess my dad had to do paperwork and wages and meet people about things, so we had the run of the ship for a couple of hours. You wouldn't do that nowadays, I remember my mum being terrified that we were all going to fall overboard because there were hardly any railings or anything like that.
"It was like a giant kids den. Apart from things like carpet and seating everything was made of metal which I really liked.
"I remember the noise when you used to run, your feet would clang on it a lot. It used to smell of engine grease and stale beer and stale bread rolls as people didn't just go there for the nightclub they would have a meal there."
Freja said that behind the bar was a broken windscreen-glass and coloured perspex map of the world that her dad made himself. Table tops were also covered in Victorian pennies that to Freja looked "like a mosaic."
Freja said: "We were each allowed us kids to get one thing from the bar, that was our special treat. I always remember getting an old fashioned bottle of coke, the ones that were kind of curvy like Marilyn Monroe and I remember drinking that and feeling very glamourous and looking at the bar with all its backdrop with lights and broken glass and thinking how glamorous it must be.
"But I think our experience of it was so different to the grownups, it was a bit of a mysterious to us. One of my favourite things about it was downstairs in the main room there was a disco dancefloor, 70s style, that lit up from underneath with the coloured squares - I thought that was really cool."
Freja said the Clubship Landfall also had a daytime menu, offering lunchtime meals to customers. She said that as licensing laws were different decades ago, the club would need a legitimate reason to stay open late and her dad would come up with "hilarious" ticketed events with the "flimsiest of excuses" - from parties celebrating Prince Phillip's birthday to marking anniversaries of lost British kings.
She said: "I've seen photographs of it rammed full, literally you couldn't move. I guess it would have been popular and a family friend also had her wedding breakfast there. "
On April 16, 1971, the Liverpool ECHO reported how Landfall had to evacuate Canning Dock because the swing bridge between the dock and the neighbouring North Salthouse Dock was to be closed permanently. In January 1972, the Clubship Landfall was also named the Liverpool Echo's 'club of the week.'
The article reads: "Liverpool has a lot of unique claims to fame - and the Clubship Landfall is undoubtedly one of them. For the Landfall is a converted tank landing craft LCT 7074 that started life in 1944 and took part in the fierce sea fighting off Sword Beach in the D-Day landings of June that year.
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Did you ever visit the Clubship Landfall? Let us know in the comments section below. See more photos of the Clubship Lanfall in our photostory below.
"In 1946 she became the floating home of the Master Mariners’ Association of Liverpool which she has remained until this day. In 1968 the club was taken over by its present owners, Compass Catering, and opened for general membership with the evenings given over to the disco set.
"Landfall has recently moved to a new berth in Collingwood Dock. You park your car in the car park opposite, mount the gangplank, cross the deck and you’re in the club itself. Down a broad stair - or companionway - is the main dancefloor and saloon boasting a wealth of decorations evoking D-Day, Merseyside history and Liverpool's present connections with the navies of the world."
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The Liverpool ECHO reported how brooding over the dancefloor was a massive diving suit once worn by diver Hector Crompton, who was 6ft 6ins and weighed 21 stone. More often that not, music was spun at the disco by co-owner Colin Peers.
It continues: "Just aft of the saloons is the lounge bar, which can be hired separately for parties and meetings and the restaurant, long and widely known for the standards of its catering. Membership of the Landfall now costs £1.50 and the club is open seven nights a week."
The latest series of Memory Lane is in major retailers including Asda, Tesco, Home Bargains and selected newsagents now. This series of the bumper picture special looks at fun in the sun - with stunning photographs and treasured memories of family holidays from years gone by. You can also buy Memory Lane online here.
Freja said: "I think new generations probably haven't heard of it which is amazing considering it was quite something. Novelty places are quite common now, novelty restaurants and nightclubs.
"I think people who remember it probably remember it quite fondly but I think it’s almost a disappeared part of Liverpool's history really which is quite a shame. It was a different world, the Albert Dock was a completely different place.
"The docks were run down, it was an area you didn't really go to but now its got these multimillion-pound apartments and multimillion-pound commercial developments, restaurants, pubs and museums. Its radically changed which is really interesting.
"I'm really sorry that my dad is missing out on this. He really liked publicising things and I'd love him to know that people are still interested in it - he’d be absolutely chuffed."
George and Colin also had a floating nightclub in Salford's Pomona Docks - The North Westward Ho - which was next door to their De Havilland Comet aeroplane that they had transformed into a restaurant. After owning the club for over a decade, in the 1980s the Clubship Landfall was sold and at one point sunk until it was rescued and restored.
Landing Craft Tank 7074 (LCT 7074) is the only known surviving ship of its kind which took part in the D-Day landings on June 6, 1944. It has since undergone extensive conservation and restoration work and is on display at The D-Day Story in Portsmouth.
Find out more about the club and Freja's memories, click here.
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