Posts Tagged "history"

MEGACITIES INTO MEGALOPOLISES: A CIRCULAR VOYAGE ROUND BOSWASH

MEGACITIES INTO MEGALOPOLISES: A CIRCULAR VOYAGE ROUND BOSWASH

Boswash? BosWHERE! – the name produces a baffling reaction to a place not officially in the atlas.  But as the above map illustrates, what were formerly separate cities and entities are getting bigger and bigger. So now it’s a megalopolis: a series of huge independent cities linked by suburban zones to form interconnectivity, geographers describing this fast-growing area of 400 miles long as Boswash – that’s Boston down to Washington DC. It’s…

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MEGA-CITIES: SINGAPORE

MEGA-CITIES: SINGAPORE

A futuristic sight to greet seafarer and tourist alike: Merlion Park, at One Fullerton,Singapore – with few suspecting that this was a malarial swamp a century ago. It’s part of the city-state and during independence from the British in 1965, Singapore faced massive unemployment and declining trade. With its back to the wall, nonetheless, the country demonstrated to the world how to modernise and progress. Singapore’s transition from a backwater economy…

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The Working Class at Sea

The Working Class at Sea

Well, I wasn’t in the Royal Navy, but if their conditions were as bad as for Merchant Navy crew, it must have been rough. On my first trip (1972) I must have been lucky in assuming that all the ship’s company including the skipper were working class. After all, only the shipowners – prosperous as far as I could tell in pin-stripe suits with…

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<strong> SIXTEEN DANGEROUS VOYAGES: THE BARQUE <em>JEANIE JOHNSON</em> IN DUBLIN HARBOUR.</strong>

 SIXTEEN DANGEROUS VOYAGES: THE BARQUE JEANIE JOHNSON IN DUBLIN HARBOUR.

Story by James Hart. Statues on Dublin quayside commemorate the victims of the 1847 Famine.  The appalling conditions of coffin ships was documented by one Robert Whyte, a passenger and journalist who, in his book ‘The Journey of an Irish Coffin Ship’  (1847) wrote of the desperation: of emigres denied food, clean water and medical attention – indeed, typhus, dysentery and starvation were part of the sometimes…

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Frank Walker – Part One

Frank Walker – Part One

A MARINERS` PARK RESIDENT RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT WAS A EUROPEAN CONFLICT DEVELOPING INTO A WORLD WAR!! A talk by Captain Peter Thomson

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Mysteries & Memories

Mysteries & Memories

This talk is to the memory of 2 young men, Robert Prescot & Maxwell Biggam who died at sea in what could be described as incompletely explained circumstances aboard the Liverpool Bridge.

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Robert Keith – Part 1

Robert Keith – Part 1

Robert was kind enough to share some of his memories including his ambition of a young age to go to sea, joining his first ship in Liverpool in 1965.

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The Sailors’ Home

The Sailors’ Home

Most visitors to the Liverpool One Shopping area will no doubt have come across an odd but striking feature. At the southern end of Paradise Street stands an elaborate structure made of wrought iron and vividly painted in green and gold. As many by now know, these are in fact the original gates to what was once a grand and…

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