OLD SHIPWRIGHTS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1791, 2 July 1913, Page 6

OLD SHIPWRIGHTS.

9— ■ DRIVING IN THE LAST NAIL. As announced ■ yesterday the Shipwrights' Society, which has been in existenco for nearly 40 years, is to bo formally disbanded at a "social" to be held 011 Saturday ovening aoi.t. In the bravo davs of old a preponderance of tho 'vessels wliich camo into port were woodenbuilt, and tho greater number were sailing vessels, which invariably wanted some' little attention at tho winds of, shipwrights after a long buffeting voyage. In those- days, too, not a little small ship and yaclit-building was done round the shores of' Lambton Harbour. Both classes of work have fallen away with the coming of iron and' steel-built steamers, and even somo of the workthafc , could l)o done in Wellington has drifted away from here on account, it is eaidi of the smaller dip charges at other ports— in Lyttelton particularly. "It is a curious tiling," remarked Mr. Paul Coffey (on<s of the oldest of Wellington's shipwrights) yesterday to a. Dominion reporter, "that .during tho last 40 years neither hours nor wages have altered a« far as shipwrights are concerned dn Wei' . lington." .