Evening Times - April 27, 2007
by Maureen Ellis
TO the hundreds of souls he's rescued from the Clyde's treacherous waters over the course of 50 years, he's labelled a hero. To crime novelist Alex Gray, there was only one title befitting George Parsonage. Quite simply, he's The Riverman.
Now the Glasgow Humane Society officer has yet another accolade to add to his MBE, St Mungo's Prize and the honorary degrees he's received over the years - he's been immortalised in fiction.
Bishopton thriller writer Alex is set to publish The Riverman, a novel inspired by George's lifesaving crusade, and his harrowing role in recovering bodies from the Clyde, next month.
"It's only a small cameo role that I have in the book, " says George, 63, modestly. "But the thread runs right through the book."
"The thread runs through the book the way the river Clyde runs through Glasgow, " adds Alex, the fifty-something author of Never Somewhere Else, A Small Weeping and Shadow of Sounds.
Alex and George have developed a symbiotic relationship since she first approached him two years ago, asking for permission to use George's half century of experience of river rescues and indeed his character in her latest fiction.
Down by the Glasgow Humane Society's boathouse at Glasgow Green, Alex notices a blue plastic football bobbing in the river close to the bank.
"Oh no, George won't like that, " she warns only minutes before George spies the offending article and shimmies down the bank to remove it to stop any passing children from falling in while trying to retrieve it. And he's quick to chastise a cox who isn't wearing her required lifejacket while coaching a rowing team on the Clyde.
Alex and George have much in common: both former schoolteachers (Alex was an English teacher; Glasgow School of Art graduate George was an art teacher) and both are parents of two children (Alex has a grown up son and daughter, George, a "late starter", has offspring aged eight and 11).
And both deal routinely with the murkier, more dangerous side of life - one through fiction, the other with the all-too real stories of life and death on the river.
"The riverman's job is to do with life and death, and a crime novel is to do with life and death, so I think it was a fitting title, " says Alex. "But it's really about George."
"Thank you, " says George, a blush almost visible beneath his ruddy complexion.
It's easy to see why his life's work makes for tantalising material, contrasting his compassion for his fellow man with the ruthless disregard for life that murderers have.
As George chats with Alex in the Winter Gardens of the People's Palace, he's dressed in full uniform with a wireless landline phone attached to the pocket of his white shirt, and two mobile phones - with "belt and braces" on two different networks - in his utility pouches. He's always poised to drop everything should a call come through from the public to say that someone is in need of his assistance on the river.
It's a vital role that his late father Ben performed before him until his death aged 76 in 1979. George has saved an estimated 1500 lives and grimly retrieved around 500 bodies from the Clyde.
But in 2005 his role changed when, on Health and Safety grounds - back then he manned the lifeboat on his own, Strathclyde Police stopped informing him of people in the river.
Rescue work is now carried out by police underwater and fire brigade rescue teams, although Strathclyde Police awarded the Humane Society a grant of GBP90,000 for its ongoing services.
Most of George's work now centres on safety campaigning, education and accident prevention work, removing river hazards, highlighting areas of safety concern and advising the council on how best to use the Clyde safely.
Alex, real name is Sandra McGruther, a former folk singer, social worker and English teacher, began writing full-time when she was forced to give up her teaching career in 1992 when struck down with ME.
HER fiction typically follows the exploits of Glasgow's monied residents, as her central characters DCI William Lorimer and psychologist Solomon Brightman try to track down the villains.
Alex says: "There are still all the passions that bring people to commit murder. There's still all the greed, the envy, the jealousy. . . this particular book is very much about greed."
"Sometimes more affluent people end up in the river because they have so much more to lose, " echoes George.
The Riverman charts the murderous circumstances surrounding the downfall of a leading accountancy firm, inspired in part by the Enron scandal in America.
The prologue of The Riverman depicts George at work, deftly fishing the body of a murdered accountant from the Clyde, careful of the currents that could drag the corpse under.
The Glasgow Humane Society was formed in 1790 by the city's Faculty of Surgeons for "the rescue and recovery of drowning persons", and is the oldest organisation of its kind in the world.
George has lived at the society's Glasgow Green HQ since he was born and and has been pulling people from the river since he was just 14.
Such is his family's fame that in 1990 a street in the Merchant City was named Parsonage Row as a tribute to George and Ben.
George is reticent about discussing his macabre finds that Alex described in print, admitting that the job can sometimes take its toll. Indeed, his father's predecessor George Geddes was killed during a rescue in 1931.
In 1995 George suffered a fractured skull when a gang dropped a concrete slab on him as he rowed under Dalmarnock Bridge.
But he remains stoical, saying:
"The only time in my life that the job ever got to me was one night when I dreamt I was taking this body out of the water and as I brought them into the boat they smiled at me and tapped my face.
"You can switch yourself off - you've got to. There's a sad story behind every rescue.
"I just blot them out and get on with it."
What prompted that dream? "I've no idea. Maybe I'd been watching Taggart the night before, " laughs George.
GEORGE was the inspiration for an STV documentary Now It's Gone narrated by Andrea McGurk after he recovered the body of her brother Gerry in 2001.
A writer himself, George's biography of his father Ben is on sale at the People's Palace, and he will be the guest of honour at the launch of Alex's novel.
"I have had to live with publicity all my life, " says George.
"If there's one person out there who reads the book and takes an interest in safety on the river, then that's a bonus."
The Riverman is published on May 3 by Sphere at Little, Brown, with a free launch event at Waterstone's, 153-157 Sauchiehall Street, at 6.30pm.