Maritime Monday for July 3rd, 2017: Y is for Yachting

Smithsonian – Boaty McBoatface Completes Its First Mission The little submarine named by the Internet investigated the icy deep waters of Antarctica’s Orkney Channel

Poster advertising release of the new book Sailing Alone Around the World by Captain Joshua Slocum, c 1900. The book was an immediate success and highly influential in inspiring later travelers. Captain Slocum was a highly experienced navigator and ship owner. He rebuilt and refitted the derelict sloop Spray in a seaside pasture at Fairhaven, Massachusetts over 13 months between early 1893 and 1894. Between 24 April 1895 and 27 June 1898, Slocum, aboard the Spray, crossed the Atlantic twice (to Gibraltar and back to South America), negotiated the Strait of Magellan, and crossed the Pacific. He also visited Australia and South Africa before crossing the Atlantic (for the third time) to return to Massachusetts after a journey of 46,000 miles. more

Lizzie Borden & The Old Fall River Line

Everyone from presidents to swindlers sailed the Sound on “Mammoth Palace Steamers” in the heyday of the side wheelers and night boats. The Fall River Line was a combination steamboat and railroad connection between New York City and Boston that operated between 1847 and 1937. For many years, it was the preferred route to take for travel between the two major cities. The line was extremely popular, and its steamboats were some of the most advanced and luxurious of their day.

The Fall River operation, then called the Bay State Steamboat Company, was launched in 1847, backed, among others, by members of the famous Borden family (otherwise celebrated for their sinewy if ill-tempered relation; Lizzie, of ax-wielding parenticide-fame).

keep reading on Cruising the Past

Guido De Craene (Actor; Born: June 2, 1955, Antwerp, Belgium) On the set of ‘Kursk‘, April 2017 in France

Kursk is an upcoming English-language French-Belgian drama film directed by Thomas Vinterberg based on Robert Moore’s book A Time to Die, about the true story of the 2000 Kursk (K-141) submarine disaster, in which 118 Russian sailors died. It stars Matthias Schoenaerts, Colin Firth, Léa Seydoux, Peter Simonischek, Max Von Sydow, Matthias Schweighöfer and Michael Nyqvist, (who died this week). wikipedia

Colin Firth Kursk Disaster Movie Delayed by Russian Defence Ministry

Wreck of Russian submarine Kursk (K-141) in a floating dock at Roslyakovo

Vladimir Putin Character Cut From Luc Besson’s Russian Thriller

With most of the wreckage recycled, only the deck cabin of the Kursk submarine remained whole. Its was preserved as a monument, having been erected in Russia’s northern port of Murmansk. The monument to submarine sailors who died in peacetime, featuring the control room of the Kursk submarine. © Alexey Kudenko / RIA Novosti

The Day the Kursk Sank: 15 Years On, Russia remembers one of worst-ever submarine tragedies

Adidas has finally released ‘The Life Aquatic’-inspired Zissou sneakers

For years fans have been begging Adidas to release a version of the customized Roms Steve Zissou (played by Bill Murray) wears in Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic. Well, the company quietly fulfilled our dreams last weekend — releasing 100 limited-edition pairs… keep reading

https://www.facebook.com/theguardian/videos/10155615331631323/

Sometime in the 1980s, Caspar Salmon’s grandmother was invited to a gathering on the Welsh island of Anglesey, attended exclusively by people with fish surnames. Or so he says. Thirty years later, film-maker Charlie Lyne attempts to sort myth from reality as he searches for the truth behind this fishy tale. from The Guardian (via Facebook)

Arents Cigarette Cards; Arctic Sites on NYPL Digitized Collections (see full set)

Samuel Pepys – (February 1633 – May 1703) was an administrator of the navy of England and Member of Parliament who is most famous for the diary that he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man. Pepys had no maritime experience, but he rose to be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under both King Charles II and King James II through patronage, hard work, and his talent for administration. Samuel Pepys Memoirs on Royal Museums Greenwich

The Medway Raid and 17th century maritime warfare

The National Archives blog (UK) – In June 1667, the Dutch fleet forced its way up the river Medway to the main naval base at Chatham. There the Dutch destroyed a number of the most powerful and valuable British warships and captured the fleet flagship, Royal Charles, named after the reigning monarch, Charles II. This was a great blow to the king’s image – the warships were powerful symbols of national prestige.

At this time, the Dutch Republic (the United Provinces of the Netherlands) was the leading seaborne trading nation. Intense British-Dutch maritime rivalry led to three wars within less than 25 years (1652-1674).

The Medway Raid is one of the greatest humiliations in British naval/military history, and as a defeat, is little-remembered today. It is, though, a central episode in the diary of Samuel Pepys and is seen as the last of a ‘triple whammy’ of disasters, following the Great Plague (1665) and the Great Fire of London (1666).

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see also: A Life Laid Bare; Samuel Pepys, Writer & Diarist on The Guardian’s Review of Books

Royal Navy: Inside HMS Queen Elizabeth – in pictures

HMS Queen Elizabeth could be vulnerable to cyber-attack

Royal Navy £3.5bn carrier appears to be running Windows XP

Britain’s new aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth, which has left the Rosyth dockyard, could be vulnerable to a cyber-attack as it appears to be using the same outdated system that left the NHS exposed. Officers aboard the £3.5bn carrier, which is the biggest and most powerful vessel ever built for the Royal Navy, insist that they are well prepared to defend against such attacks and will have a team of cyber specialists on board.

keep reading on The Guardian

Students from the Kennebunk High School Alternative Education program built “The Little Boat That Could” and launched it on Dec. 29 near Georges Bank. It washed up and was found in Scotland on Friday by John and Angelika Dawson while they were walking their dog. Courtesy of John and Angelika Dawson

Little boat built by students in Kennebunk completes Atlantic crossing

After 168 days and 12 hours at sea, a small sailboat built by high school students in Kennebunk washed ashore in Scotland after traveling thousands of miles.

The 5-foot boat washed up on Balivanich Airport Beach on the island of Benbecula, where it was found Friday by John and Angelika Dawson, tourists from British Columbia, as they were walking their dog. The couple notified local police, who called the Scottish coast guard. keep reading

Y is for YACHTING, and Z is the ZEST; The A B C of Sports : a series of 25 cigarette trading cards issued by Ogden’s in the later 1920’s.

“Lost” posted by Derk Remmers – “Avantis III” was a cargo ship with a length of 80 meters and a total capacity of 2.362 tones. It was constructed in 1977 in Norway and its first name was “Akershus”. It sank on 19 November 2004 in the morning, in 20 minutes, after crashing into the rocks of “Doroussa” islet… more

Option 2: Island hopping. According to these plans, the Nazis would launch an assault on Norfolk, Virginia. First, the Germans would rendezvous with the ‘Jap fleet’ via the Azores, Madeira and Canaries

What if the Nazis had invaded America? Maps reveal how Hitler could have attacked the U.S. (as imagined by 1942 issue of Life magazine)

A German postcard of Captain August Carl Thiele handing over the German Ultimatum on 6 December 1897 during the Luders Affair; a legal and diplomatic embarrassment to the Haitian government

Imperial German plans for the invasion of the United States

Germany’s Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm II

Imperial German plans for the invasion of the United States were ordered by Germany’s Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm II from 1897 to 1903. Wilhelm II did not intend to conquer the US; he wanted only to reduce the country’s influence.

His planned invasion was supposed to force the US to bargain from a weak position; to sever its growing economic and political connections in the Pacific, the Caribbean and South America; and to increase Germany’s influence in those places.

The first plan, made in the winter of 1897–1898, mainly targeted American naval bases in Hampton Roads (in an attempt) to reduce and constrain the US Navy and threaten Washington, D.C… keep reading

“I saw three ships”(detail) posted by John Cox

“The Mariner’s Revenge Song” is a song by The Decemberists from their 2005 album Picaresque. The story begins as the narrator, one of two survivors stranded in the belly of a whale, explains to his companion how (previously unknown) how their lives came to be interwoven.

Mariner’s Revenge has been one of the Decemberists’ most popular live performances, and has been played at virtually every live show as an encore since its release. more