Maritime Life and Traditions No. 28

Table of Contents NEGOTIATING ‘THE NARROWS’ By Adrian Osler The Port of Tyne in northeast England has, for centuries, been one of England’s busiest and most profitable maritime centres. It has benefited, commercially, from a long era as an independent port and so, while its technology may have dramatically changed since 1905, in its management and ethos things in 2005 are not always so very different. THE CHESAPEAKE BAY SKIPJACKS By Philippe Goulletquer, Catherine Simon-Goulletquer, and Bob Grieser In the late nineteenth century Maryland was the world’s leading producer of oysters. but since 1885 overfishing, pollution, and disease in Chesapeake Bay have caused a progressive decline in the fishery. Today even the skipjack, last living example of working sail in the North America, seems to be facing the end. With new conservation programmes getting under way is there a future for the fishery — or is it all too late? WHY PILOT CUTTERS? By Tom Cunliffe Author and long-distance sailor, Tom Cunliffe explores his love of Bristol Channel pilot cutters and the influences behind Westernman, a modern reinterpretation by Nigel Irens for the genuine article. GOTHEBORG By Holly Hollins In early autumn 2004 the first Swedish East Indiaman to be launched in 200 years was christened by Queen Sylvia in Gothenburg. Later this year she will set sail for China in a re-enactment of the eighteenth-century voyages of the ship after which she has been built. IT'S ALL TRUE By Jean-Paul Mathelier In 1941 film was shot of four Brazilian fishermen who had sailed a crude raft 1,650 miles from Fortaleza to Rio de Janeiro. Although not seen for fifty years the film was to be their only surviving testimony. Yet for Orson Welles, the man who captured their images, it was to cause lasting and irreparable damage to what would have been a golden career.