ShipSide
Originally uploaded by Redgum
...that up until the 1870's, it was common practice to so overload ships that only a few feet, or even a few inches showed below the main decks, and that these ships were happily insured, no questions asked? That sailors could be sent to jail for refusing to sail in them?
Well these things were news to me when I read The Plimsoll Sensation, by Nicolette Jones. There is a lot more of course, including the struggles of our hero of the day, Mr Samuel Plimsoll, after whom those white lines on the sides of ships are named.
At least a passing interest in things maritime will help with this one, and I found it a little stodgy to read in one helping. I've found it's better digested in bite size peices.
More than anything else it's interesting to see how attitudes and politics have changed in the last one hundred or so years.