The precise
history of UptheBeavers is largely uncertain. As
a result of several myths and legends surrounding
its development it is sometimes difficult to separate
the facts from the fictions.
Mr T: An early inspiration |
However, it is widely recognised
that it was during the early days of 2000 that
many of those later involved with UptheBeavers,
including venerable editor Ivor Skrewkyk, developed
their first swimming-themed website: Mr T’s
Swimming Clinic.
Mr T’s Swimming Clinic
(or MTSC as it did not become known) was developed
for Harrow
and Wealdstone Swimming Club as the first
stage of their move into the exciting world of
swimming club websites. The site was wildly popular
amongst both the people who visited it, but completely
failed to attract widespread support.
To make matters worse Harrow
and Wealdstone sadly did not, at the time, have
any particular interest in developing a website
and so the idea was quietly allowed to die. Today
the Harrow and Wealdstone website is very different
from that first effort, but what it now currently
lacks in humorous content it more than makes up
for in strangely psychedelic intro pages.
By 2001 the future UptheBeavers team had grown
substantially and was all but assembled. It was
at this time that they began work on the first
incarnation of the Barnet
Copthall Swimming Club website.
Instrumental to the development
of the first Copthall website, and
all subsequent versions of UptheBeavers websites,
was Kozmo.com, the New York-based rapid delivery
company. Kozmo had been one of the darlings of
the early dotcom era and had expanded rapidly into
the UK - only to then go bust equally rapidly.
The overwhelming majority of the hardware, equipment
and software used, still to this day, to produce
UptheBeavers was purchased at a massive discount
from Kozmo UK, just after it went under.
For a club with such a large masters squad, it
was always assumed that masters would be a large
aspect of the Barnet Copthall Club site and initially
the masters squad site was included seamlessly
within the main site.
However, after one too
many jokes about Sally Tuttmillerball’s
boobs (i.e. one joke) it was decided that a distinction
between the masters and main club content would
be necessary, and that the only effective way
to achieve this was through the development of
totally separate and independent websites.
Originally the new designated
masters site was developed under the working title
of The
Qualifying Times. Unfortunately, a legal wrangle
over use of the famous logo from The
Times newspaper meant
a change of name was forced upon the developers.
The fact that the code for the website was stolen
straight from The Times web servers might
also have led to a further legal stumbling block
in later months.
The original design
for UptheBeavers |
Inspired by the masters squad’s
widely remembered nickname, GoBeavers.com was
the next choice, but sadly that was unavailable,
as was WetBeavers.com. After some further
investigation and deliberation the final choice
was whittled down to three options: SuperBeavers,
ChampionBeavers and UptheBeavers. The
first two were rejected for sounding too self-congratulatory,
leaving UptheBeavers.com to be adopted as the new
URL.
The name 'UptheBeavers' was inspired,
in part, by the Arsenal Football Club fanzine UptheArse.
Only later did it emerge that there were some unforeseen
sexual connotations associated with both UptheArse.net
and UptheBeavers.com. However, the site had been
running for over two years before these alternative
interpretations were discovered and so the difficult
decision was taken not to change the name for fear
of confusing visitors.
The first UptheBeavers
office |
Initially the site was able to
achieve funding from the Department
for Culture, Media and Sport; Sport
England; the National
Lottery Heritage Fund and the European
Regional Development Fund.
Unfortunately, consistently high
property prices within the London Borough of Barnet
meant that the first UptheBeavers office was more
functional than luxurious. In an attempt to generate
more income and finance a move to more suitable
offices a website shop was developed. To date,
all four of the people to order items from the
Beavershop have been reasonably happy with their
purchases.
The Beavershop is probably
most famous for providing Mark
Foster with a
controversial ‘Bill
Sweetenham Calls Me Sir’ t-shirt during
the European Masters Championships. Foster was
one of a series of notable swimmers to be interviewed
for UptheBeavers, including world champion James
Gibson and Olympic medallist Stephen
Parry.
The new UptheBeavers
office |
At the end of 2005, widespread
fame was to briefly arrive thanks to an unexpected
appearance in
The Sun newspaper. This coverage lead
to a significant increase in revenue, finally allowing
the team to move to a new office and for a complete
redesign of the site to begin.
After over six minutes of dedicated concentration
the new, wider, slightly more exciting site went
live in early 2006.
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