Crosbie Smith

Coal, Steam and Ships (eBook, ePUB)

Engineering, Enterprise and Empire on the Nineteenth-Century Seas

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

Crosbie Smith explores the trials and tribulations of first-generation Victorian mail steamship lines, their passengers, proprietors and the public. Eyewitness accounts show in rich detail how these enterprises engineered their ships, constructed empire-wide systems of steam navigation and won or lost public confidence in the process. Controlling recalcitrant elements within and around steamship systems, however, presented constant challenges to company managers as they attempted to build trust and confidence. Managers thus wrestled to control shipbuilding and marine engine-making, coal consumption, quality and supply, shipboard discipline, religious readings, relations with the Admiralty and government, anxious proprietors, and the media - especially following a disaster or accident. Emphasizing interconnections between maritime history, the history of engineering and Victorian culture, Smith's innovative history of early ocean steamships reveals the fraught uncertainties of Victorian life on the seas.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Cambridge University Press
• Erscheinungstermin: 5. Juli 2018
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781108186919
• Artikelnr.: 54134209

Autorenporträt

Crosbie Smith was Professor of History of Science at the University of Kent until he retired in 2014 to concentrate on research. Two of his books have won the History of Science Society's Pfizer Award: The Science of Energy (1998) and Energy and Empire (Cambridge, 2009), which he co-wrote with Norton Wise.

Inhaltsangabe

Introduction: coal, steam and ships; Part I. North Atlantic Steam: 1.
'Trust in the promises of God': the moral and spiritual credibility of
steam navigation; 2. 'The character of fine workmanship': making
Clydeside's marine engineering reputation; 3. 'A swarm of projectors':
promises of North Atlantic steam navigation; 4. 'This noble vessel':
realizing the promises of transatlantic steam; 5. 'Giving rich promise of
serious intentions': Mr Cunard's line of steamers; 6. 'Proprietor of the
Atlantic Ocean': politics and patronage on the seas; Part II. Westward for
Panama: 7. 'Mail-coaches of the ocean': the West India Company project; 8.
'A most perilous enterprise': Royal Mail Steam Packet's vulnerabilities; 9.
'In highly creditable order': RMSP's new board of management in action; 10.
'She was one mass of fire': reading the maiden voyage of the Royal Mail
Steamer Amazon; 11. 'An uncompromising adherence to punctuality': Pacific
Steam from Valparaiso to Panama; Part III. Eastward for India and China:
12. 'Built on a large, commodious and powerful scale': forging P&O's
Eastern Mail Steamship system; 13. 'So great a cloud of obloquy and
mistrust': locking and unlocking the secrets of a maritime empire; 14. 'A
more desirable result in the performance of the vessel': P&O's mail
steamers in action; Part IV. Engineering an Oceanic Economy: 15. 'She would
be perfectly stable and strong': rival systems of engineering economy; 16.
'The engines were imperfect': Pacific Steam's coal economy; 17. 'A constant
succession of unfathomable and costly experiments': making credible the
marine compound engine; 18. 'The modern Clyde ships': economy and power for
ocean steam navigation; Epilogue: 'The sovereignty of the seas' - the
maritime system builders.