Liverpool's Shipping Groups
ISBN: 0 7524 2374 6
pp 128
Author: Ian Collard
Published by:
Tempus Publishing Ltd, The Mill, Brimscombe Port, Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL3 2QG www.tempus-publishing.com
Tempus Publishing Ltd, 2 Cumberland Street, Charleston, SC 29401 USA.
- Price £12.99 in UK $19.99 in USA
Liverpool's Shipping Groups is the latest book from Merseyside maritime author and photographer Ian Collard to be published by Tempus Publishing in their very shelvable and collectable range of maritime titles.
This book serves to provide an historical overview of the shipping groups which operated out of the Port of Liverpool during the heyday of ocean shipping. Some names such as Cunard, Harrison and Ellerman are well remembered as shipping line names in their, own right. However, other shipping groups are less well known as they often formed a holding company for operators whose trading names held a higher profile in the public eye. such as Cayzer, Irvine & Company proprietors of Clan Line and Union Castle. Each of the main groups is covered by the book's seven chapters:
- Cunard
- Ocean Group
- Ellerman Lines
- Cayzer, Irvine & Co
- Furness Group
- Harrison Line
- Vestey Group
Each chapter of Liverpool's Shipping Groups provides a concise history of each of the groups and their constituent companies from foundation through to their present status, in some cases still existing as small subsidiary of a larger owner or organisation, [Cunard / Furness Withy] or as a business outside of ship owning and operation [Ocean].
Illustrations follow the successful formula adopted by previous books from the same author, that of mixing ship photographs with extracts from company publicity material, shipping lists, schedules etc. Perusal of these and the consideration of the long lost facilities once available, particularly for passengers, proving to be of equal interest to the photographs of the ships themselves.
Today a stroll down to Prince's Landing Stage at the right time will usually reveal a line of cars awaiting to board Sea Container's sailings for Douglas or Dublin. Back in the 1950s a line of cars may have been seen drawn up on the landing stage for carriage on a much longer journey by Cunard Liner to the USA or Canada.
The cover of the Cunard brochure [left] shows typical 1950s "chrome and wings" saloons lined up on the old Prince's Landing Stage whilst one car is swung up over a ship's side. Today's trans-Atlantic traveller would probably not even think of taking their car or motorcycle "across the pond" preferring to hire a vehicle at their destination if their stay was of short duration - how times have changed!
Then who cannot fail to have their mouth watered by the breakfast menu presented to passengers on the SYLVANIA on Thursday, February 13, 2025 or the REINA DEL MAR's dinner menu? The mixture of photographs and memorabilia adds to the "browsability" of Ian's books.
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State of The Art - First Blue Funnel Ship berths at the new Vittoria Dock Terminal - 1967 |
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| Ellerman's City of Liverpool at East Float. |
Most of the ship photographs in the book cover a period from the 1950's through to the late 1970s, with some older and more recent photographs. However, what is remarkable is just how much the shipping scene has changed in the two decades that have passed since the end of the 1970s. Bulkers and box ships of varying sizes now predominate on Merseyside as elsewhere, the days of small unit cargo and passenger facilities have disappeared as have most of the shipping groups covered by this book in the name of progress, efficiency and economy.
Liverpool's Shipping Groups will take you on another nostalgic trip down Memory Lane for those who can remember the golden days of shipping and broaden the horizons and increase knowledge of what has been lost for younger generations or those whose interest in ships and the sea has been a more recent development.
Once again this is another very worthwhile book to add to the growing library of material covering Merseyside and the Port of Liverpool.
John. H. Luxton
April 6, 2025
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