Unseaworthy Ship, The

DESCRIPTION: "The doomed ship weighs anchor, out she is bound, With cargo too heavy and timbers unsound." "Honour to Plimsoll, his labors will save Thousands of brave men from watery graves." The singer recalls lost ships and calls for the passage of Plimsoll's bill
AUTHOR: "J. Smith, Denholme, near Bingley" (source: broadside Firth c.16(408)
EARLIEST DATE: before 1900 (broadside Bodleian Firth c.26(223)=Firth c.26(251))
KEYWORDS: ship disaster political
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Palmer-OxfordBookOfSeaSongs 128, "The Unseaworthy Ship" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #V20171
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Firth c.26(223)=Firth c.26(251), "The un-seaworthy ship," T. Pearson (Manchester), 1850-1899; also Firth c.12(122) (unknown, n.d.); Firth c.16(408) (unknown, n.d.)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Driven from Home" (tune)
NOTES [141 words]: Samel Plimsoll (1824-1898) was MP for Derby 1868-1880, and was deeply concerned with ship safety. He promoted various laws on the subject, but the one that "stuck" came in 1876, when the "Plimsoll Mark" was adopted to show the "Plimsoll Line" -- that is, to show whether a ship was overloaded or not: if the Plimsoll Mark (which you can easily see online) was submerged below the safe line, then the ship was overloaded and was forbidden from sailing.
The idea proved so useful that ships still have Plimsoll Marks to this day, and I even heard about a recent lawsuit over whether the Mark can be trademarked. (Such is the state of copyright law that, even though it is self-evident that the Plimsoll Mark is out of copyright, the company using the Mark stopped making T-shirts with it just because it was too expensive to fight the case..) - RBW
Last updated in version 4.4
File: PaSe1128

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