Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
Josef Ressel, an inventor who helped pioneer key advances in ship propellers, was born in the town of Chrudim in Bohemia (at the time under the rule of the Austrian branch of the royal House of Habsburg and now part of the Czech Republic). Ressel studied at various institutions, including an artillery school in the... Continue Reading →
The SS Savannah became the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ship was built in 1818 by the New York shipbuilding firm of Fickett & Crockett. During its construction, Captain Moses Rogers asked the Savannah-based shipping company, Scarborough & Isaacs, to convert it to a steamship with the goal of providing the world's... Continue Reading →
A sailing replica of the 18th-century Swedish ship Götheborg was launched. The ceremony took place in the presence of members of the Swedish royal family at the Terra Nova shipyard in Gothenburg on Sweden’s west coast. The original ship had been built for the Swedish East India Company, which conducted trade with East Asia, and... Continue Reading →
Jon Sanders set sail from the port city of Fremantle in the state of Western Australia for a planned record-setting series of voyages across the globe on board his 44-foot yacht Parry Endeavour. Sanders, who was born in Western Australia’s capital city of Perth in 1939, aspired to circumnavigate the world a total of three... Continue Reading →
Just three days before her 17th birthday, Australian sailor Jessica Watson – arriving in Sydney Harbour at 1:53 p.m. in her boat Ella’s Pink Lady -- completed a solo non-stop circumnavigation of the Southern Hemisphere. A pink carpet was set out for her and, as she walked on it after getting out of the boat,... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 