Oldendorff Centenary Book - Flipbook - Page 147
FULL-STEAM AHEAD
The use of steel and steam powered the
rebuilding of the global fleet after WWI.
Shipping is more than flashy luxury passenger liners, floating hotels or
fast ferries. The real workhorses of the industry are the untiring freighters,
be they tramp ships or liner vessels. In the old days trampers used to be
humble ships certainly not over-engined and with modest cargo gear. They
would seek and load cargo wherever offered, hopefully at rates that made
ends meet. To this day ballast positioning voyages are part of the game as
are, if less frequently, idle times. And then there are specialised ships far
and few between in the Twenties but quite numerous in this day and age.
World War I, terminated in 1918, left the world fleet decimated but had not
impaired the role of the irreplaceable ocean-going steamer. The advent of
steamers gave birth to regular and reliable liner services around the globe
and on many a local or regional route. Trade expanded in tune with rapid
industrialisation during the second half of the nineteenth century and
shipping duly followed suit. Initially liner and semi-liner services would be
the almost exclusive domain of steamers. In the year 1880 the merchant
navies of all European nations totalled 127,170 sailships and no more than
13,858 steamers. 1860 is acknowledged as the absolute peak of European
sailships which outnumbered steamers at the rate of 92,270 to 2,974. That
ratio steadily declined ever since and steamers increasingly catered for bulk
cargoes, a virtual monopoly occupied by sailships well into the first decade
of this century.
Large barks and full-rigged ships went through a short illusory boom during
a few years following 1919 when ships were scarce, but many different
types of sailships held their own much longer in the coastal trades and in
fishery. Steel had replaced brittle iron and as early as 1901, a full 95% of
vessel newbuildings worldwide were made of steel. The first motorships
already traded in 1920 but marine engines were yet to commence their real
development and assumed a leading role only from 1950 onwards.
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