A LOST ART

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 June 1932, Page 12

A LOST ART

NAMING OF SHIPS. I Where are the old sailing ships- of ‘yesterday. The answer is simple. They have disappeared because their day has passed. But where are the names of the old sailing ships of yesterday? They too have gone. But why? There is no reason. The art of naming ships apparently went out on the tide which took the last of the clippers, and any ] old name, it seems, is .good enough I for the shipowner of this age. / Old sailormen deplore the passing of the names that graced the clippers of half a century and more ago. The (.hips, they grudgingly admit, had to give way to the smoky steamers and purring motor ships, but why, they asK, could the old names not have been retained. There is£ no answer that will satisfy them. In his race to keep up with the times the shipowner has overlooked the fact that a name that appeals to the imagination will be remembered when another less original is forgotten. The :-.ca traveller of to-day can easily forget the name of the liner that carries him swiftly whither he wants to go, but how long would he remember Cock-o-the-Walk, or Orange Blossom, or Wings of the Wind? Surely as long as. he remembered anything. A glance through Lloyd’s Register —probably the most carefully compiled publication in the world —shows how completely the shipowner of today has disregarded any whisperings of his imagination when seeking names for his ships. In nine cas-.s out of ten, it would seem, the shipowner has turned over the pages of an atlas until his eyes have lighted on some name which he has thought would not look out of place on his newest unit. But why not a name that would definitely look out of place, a name that was not totally barren of that romance which has always been associated with the sea? If the owner has not solicited the aid of the atlas the chances are that he has turned to his family tree. Many a ship carries the name of a person that means nothing to anypne except those within the select family circle from which it has been selected.

Of small importance indeed must be- the place on the map that cannot find its name within the pages of Lloyd’s Register. Cities and towns, mountains and plains, lakes and rivers—they are all there. In ocean leviathans and small fry alike the atlas is well advertised. It is natural to suppose that this wholesale poaching of names from the map has led to many anomalies, and probably not a little confusion. But the practice still goes bn.

STRAYED FROM THE TRACK. It is only fair to say that a few firms have strayed from the stere'' typed naming track. Alfred Holt and Co., better known as the Blue Funnel Line, have turned to mythological works for such names as. Ulysses, Nestor and Aeneas, while the Harrison Line struck a new, but perhaps too material note with their Dramatist, Architect and others. The Austra-lian-firm of Howard Smith and Company showed some originality in naming their ships after cycles of time, and the register- received the names of Aeon, Era and Age. In New Zealand shipowners haVo hardly set an example that can be followed by the rest of the world. The Union Company started with the names of New Zealand lakes—Takapuna, Rotorua, Taupo, Brunner and lots of others. When these names became scarce the company turned to the rivers for such names as Kawatiri and Manawatu. Ships purchased

from other countries were not renamed, and consequently the names of tho units of the red funnel fleet became well mixed. When the company went into the island trade island names—Taviunu, Ovalau, Upolu, Tofua and Navua were chosen. The Niagara was so named to show the company’s association with Canada and the All Red route, while Aorangi is the Maori name for Mount Cook. The Northern Company, with its .Claymore, Clansman, lona and Galrloch, had Scottish names for many of their early steamers. Like the Union Company, however, the Northern Company did not bother about changing the names of the vessels that came into their hands, and the

naming of the fleet to-day is a thing of patches. Most of the Devonport Ferry Company’s steamers are named after birds, but there are exceptions that spoil the list. Britain is not alone in the original naming of ships, and thousands of foreign vessels have names that can be turned up on the map. American shipowners once showed . a family pride in the naming of their vessels, but the practice seems to be dyine out. Yankee freighters with such teeth-grinding names as West Cajoot and West Conob have brought their lumber ajid case oil into Auckland

from tho Pacific coast. In the days when Queen Bess ruled England the names on the towering bows of the great wooden walls meant everything. Dreadnought, Repulse and Revenge are but three of the names that have been handed down and to-day they still grace the pages of the Navy list.

But what of the commercial ships of a few decades ago? With the passing of the wind ships went the romantic names they carried. Lottery, Pride of the Morning, Red Jacket, Skimmer of the Sea, Happy-Go-Lucky. Tally-Ho, Flower Land, and Spirit of the Age are but a few of the grand old names that are now despised. The old Circular Saw Line, which played so large a part in the early shipping activities of New Zealand, boasted such names as Will-o’-the-Wisp, Willie Winkle, Tartar, Tickler, Teaser and Harvest Home, but they disappeared with the ships. One wonders whether the art of naming ships has been lost for ever. If such is the case the day may come when numbers will replace names, and what old sailormen there are left will begin to wonder whether they ever really went to sea.