SHIPS AS HOBBY

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 149, 16 February 1932, Page 2

SHIPS AS HOBBY

' SOME COLLECTIONS PRINTS, FLAGS AND OTHER SOUVENIRS FROM VESSELS. • INTEREST TO LANDSMEN. To tlie man or boy living niiles inland and seeing ships at the most on the annual holiday at the seaside, shlps hardly seem promising as a hobby, says a writer in the Weekly Grardian. But consider how a new hobby may be grafted on others, one wliich has the advantage of being quite inexpensive, of considerable educational value, and whieh can be carri( d about, as it were, in the pocket. The Navy Weeks, now held annually make for greater interest in the naval ships, and the desire for knowledge both of ships and their equipnient is on the increase. So that if we take only a passing interest in these things, we have added something to our leisure hours. Fortunately, there is a large and increasing literature about ithe sea and its ships. One publisher alone had close upon a dozen volumes- on ships appearing in one year, any of which would serve the lover of the sea and the vessels which go to and fro upon it. One aspect of the hobby is to collect everything of interest which can be obtamed eoncerning it. Th'is, of course, means some expenditure, though by purchasing second-hand the outlay may be kept quite small. But there is 110 need to spend a penny on books, providing a free library is available. Here not only books may be borrowed, but the weekly and monthly periodicals devoted to "the more popular side of shipping may be consulted. Some of them, like the Blue Peter and the Shipping World, are splendidly illustrated and very brightly written. Quite a number of people will not be within reach of a free library, others there will be who are unable to alford the collection of a nautical library, or perhaps even to subscribe for the magazines indicated, but there is still a means of keeping in touch, particularly with the mercantile fleet. It is done at the expense of a few coppers for postage. The big shipping eompanies all have very energetie publieity sections which are ready and willing to distribute some very handsome brochures dealing with their manifold activities. Postcards and albums showing their liners are matched with interesting letterpress, 'in some cases giving the history oi the line and of the ships which have made it famous.

Collector's Method. One collector lives far from the sea, and has never travelled upon a liner, though he has managed to get over quite a good number during his annual holiday, whieh, by the way, he spends at one of our great liner ports. He gets considerable enjoyment out of prowling round the docks. There is scareely a big ship afloat 'wliich he does not know by repute, if not by a visit. He can tell you their tonnage, their speed, and their building date. He follows them with the greatest interest, and if asked where, say, the Franconia is at the present moment, if he could not give it from memory — which he often does — he could certainly do by a reference to his scrap hook. He has newspaper cuttings covering a century, though they did not all appear in old newspapers. In most cases he has garnered them from the newspapers of today, especially those journeys which have a column relating what was happening a century ago. He has a section arranged in alphabetical order with the names of ships. Half a page to a ship is usually allotted, and here he records anything of interest about her. Many interesting facts appear, one of which is that Cunard liners have always had red funnels with blaclc tops, and that they came to have them because the builders of the first four vessels of the Cunard fleet — as far back as ninety years ago — were also the constructors of the Isle of Man steamers. The proprietors of the latter wanted to be distinctive, and instead of having the usual black funnels, used by praetically every steattiship company of that day, they asked for colour. The scrap hook says that a man consulted about the matter produced the red which became standard for the Isle of Man boats, later the Cunard, and now copied extensively elsewhere. In another book he has a collection of prints of warships, cut from illustrated periodicals. Underneath each picture is given some brief details of the ship and her service. There is the Captain, for instance. This ship's design was really due to the duel between the United States Monitor and Merrimae, and its construction upset all the canons of naval theory and practice. But the Captain lacked stability and was lost. There is a note under the picture that her flag is preserved in a Covenr^y chureh. Ships in Silhouette. How many remember the ill-fated Eurydice and her foundering with over 300 fine lads when almost home from the West Indies? This collector has a. small box fashioned from the timbers of the luckless training ship. He .also has a garden hut, and its walls are lined with beautiful coloured prints of famous clippers, each neatly framed in passe-pai*tout (homemade frames, of course). All, these were "given as cover pictures for a well known nautical monthly. In this garden hut, quite 50 miles from the nearest bit of blue water, one

feels quite a son of the sea. He has a sailing list on the wall, too, and each week he spends a happy halfhour with his Sunday paper bringing it up-to-date. He has a series of silhouettes which is fascinating. There, in hull form only, are examples of all the biggest liners, whilst another set shows the silhouette proper of every land of ship seen upon the sea. Those silhouettes, cut from black paper and certainly well worth while. Undermounted upon white cardboard, are neath is a neatly written legend giving name, speed, tonnage, building date, and line in the case of the mercantile ship, and rather briefer particulars of warships. He also has a big sheet of flags — coloured these — and they take the eye because they tell of countries, of letters of the alphabet, of signals, and they take the eye because they tell of steamship lines. The collection, it will be realised, is most interesting and informative.