Box Boats: How Container Ships Changed the World

by Brian J. Cudahy

Book Overview

Fifty years ago--on April 26, 1956--the freighter Ideal X steamed from Berth 26 in Port Newark, New Jersey. Flying the flag of the Pan-Atlantic Steamship Company, she set out for Houston with an unusual cargo: 58 trailer trucks lashed to her top deck.

But they weren't trucks--they were steel containers removed from their running gear, waiting to be lifted onto empty truck beds when Ideal X reached Texas. She docked safely, and a revolution...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0823225682
• ISBN13: 9780823225682
• Release Date: April 2006
• Publisher: Fordham University Press
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.3" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Box Boats

The very comprehensive story of container ships and the advent of ocean containers. This should be taught in all American history classes in high schools. A follow-on book needs to be written about intermodalism---the story of how some American Steamship companies invented the stack train concept and ultimately financially saved the hide-bound American railroads in the 1980's.

Good book on Container Shipping/Containerships.

Goes into the dynamics of the industry, Focusing on these often ignored beautiful Vessels, Containerships and Containershipping. How it has in fact changed the world,sometimes depending on who you ask for the worst or better. Mostly for the better as far as getting something faster and across the world, But at the same time there is no American Containershipping line left(Only domestic) Sea-Land Was Gobbled Up By Maersk. APL is owned by NOL. This book goes into detail and is a good read.

How The Goods Get Delivered...

As a merchant mariner and retired USN Operations Specialist I have spent nearly thirty years sailing the world's oceans and observing the ubiquitous container ships on every sea lane and in every port. This book has given me a new appreciation for these giant cargo vessels and their vital role in global commerce. Not a scholarly treatise but a readable, comprehensive look at the history of importance of container shipping. Highly recommended!

A fascinating, detailed account

BOX BOATS: HOW CONTAINER SHIPS CHANGED THE WORLD tells how the first container ship in 1956 changed the entire shipping industry, introducing a concept and transportation idea which would revolutionize the costs of shipping goods. From the Pan-Atlantic's owner who first thought about loading his trucks on board to his evolving line which grew into a giant container service, Cudahy charts not just the evolution of one company, but its impact on and changes within the world shipping and steamship industries as a whole. A fascinating, detailed account. Diane C. Donovan California Bookwatch

Story of the Development of a New Industry

Like a lot of other significant advances in technology modern dry cargo carriage was really put together by one man, Malcom McLean. Fifty years ago McLean, the president of McLean Trucking came up with the idea of taking trailers directly on board ships for transport to a port near their final destination. To minimize the space requirements, he had a special trailer developed that would carry a standardized trailer body. The idea of the container was born. The first shipment in the spring of 1956 used a converted ship that could carry fifty eight trailer bodies. The idea was successful beyond the wildest dreams. The concept of a trailer body being loaded anywhere in the world, trucked to a port, transported by ship to another port, and then trucked to its final destination has literally changed the way business is done. It is largely responsible for the way today's world of manufacture being anywhere in the world and still supplying the world's markets. This book is about half a biography of McLean, and his life. But his life largely paralleled that of the container business. The other half tells the story of the rest of the industry. Malcom Mclean is little known outside the shipping industry. But his creation of the way the world now ships products deserves to be better known. He is one of the titans of industry.