[RHP]

Looking through the Blue Star fleet list there were ships named after many towns, cities, ports and countries, however never a Liverpool Star despite the ciy's global shipping and commercial importance and the Vestey family being from Liverpool originally.

Any idea why this might have been?

[Ron Stringer]

Good taste?

[Pat Kennedy]

Originally Posted by Ron Stringer

Good taste?

No Manchester Star either

[Engine Serang]

Originally Posted by RHP

never a Liverpool Star

Any idea why this might have been?

What about Cilla Black?

[Pat Kennedy]

Originally Posted by Engine Serang

What about Cilla Black?

She was re-registered to leafy Berkshire

[spongebob]

Vesty was such a tight parse that he might have ignored British Cities in case he was taxed for the priveledge

[David Wilcockson]

Originally Posted by Pat Kennedy

She was re-registered to leafy Berkshire

But returned to Liverpool in the end.

[RHP]

Originally Posted by spongebob

Vesty was such a tight parse that he might have ignored British Cities in case he was taxed for the priveledge

Is there any truth in that SB or are you just taking a swing? Surely the place of registration would sort that out?

[spongebob]

Originally Posted by RHP

Is there any truth in that SB or are you just taking a swing? Surely the place of registration would sort that out?

As far as the NZ meat industry was concerned during the 1950's to 1970's Lord Vesty showed definite frugality toward his investments here unlike other overseas owned plants that continued with equipment updates and modifications to meet the forecast demands but perhaps he was privy to the outcome of Britain's entry into the EEC which saw our meat industry undergo rapid retrenchment and change.
An old school friend of mine finished up as chief Engineer of Vesty's biggest NZ plant and I gained some insights from him during the years gone by.
Weather or not this attitude was reflected in attitudes within the Blue Star line l do not know.
So perhaps I am taking a swing , as you put it , but as you say registration would sort that out.

Bob

[kauvaka]

Vesty certainly had a terrible reputation in Aotearoa NZ during the 60s.
Whether the comments about him were justified depends on if you think everyone one should pay one's taxes as per scale or if you think tax avoidence is OK.

[Gordon Waller]

There was an "English Star" and a "Scottish Star" but none named for U.K towns or cities.

[holland25]

Also a Saxon and Norman Star.

[Brent Chambers]

Generalized names such as "Caledonia"(Scotland), "Celtic", "Gaelic", "Royal", "Stuart", "Ulster" about covers the UK-oriented names.

[RHP]

It was clearly a deliberate decision, surprised no one has the reason behind it!

[sternchallis]

Originally Posted by spongebob

Vesty was such a tight parse that he might have ignored British Cities in case he was taxed for the priveledge

Most ship names were of the places we sailed too, not from. The Newcastle Star - Newcastle Australia. Brazil, Brasilia, Tacoma. Avila, Andalucia class were all Spanish names, but we didn't trade with Spain much, but perhaps he wanted an "A" boat class again, who knows. He had the L&H- Painters, the Booth Line - Saints. I think most large shipping companies used a theme for their ships, it certainly made it easier.
The RN is the same with their different classes of ships, Flower Class Corvettes, Admirals for battleships, V&W destroyers.
Well, they were good feeders and as far as spares and stores they didn't skimp on those either. No problem sending stuff ashore to be repaired.
The ships always looked smart and woe betide if a funnel flood was out at night and he was visiting that port.
He would always inspect his ships from bow to stern , Focsle, up and down the hatches, galley, cold rooms, ER , tunnel and Steering gear compartment.
He once tore a strip off a Chief that had just joined,( in fact we all had) because the last crowd had painted all the shafting down the tunnel with red boot topping, to stop it rusting supposedly. Most ships used to have coir mats on each length and a bit of oil which kept it polished. So the greasers had to remove it all with paint stripper, scrapers, emery cloth etc.
It was a good company compared to some of the stories I have read on here.
He didn't run off with the Company Pension fund like some and always kept it topped up.
The original Vesteys who started the company paid to have the tower of the Anglican Cathedral in Liverpool finished as the church had run out of money ( if you believe that), so now all the Vesteys & spouses have a memorial stone on the Port side outer wall of the Cathedral.
The Vesteys raised the cows and sheep and every company in between right up to the butchers was his, all under various names for tax and liability purposes. Each ship was owned by a one off company he owned for the same reason no doubt. At one bit he had a string of Travel Agents throughout Britain, so he did employ a lot of people, but Maggi caught up with him on the tax issue. She must have been feeling the pinch after the Falkands, even though we had several ships down there managed by BSSM, whose office was the old White Star building, now a gaudy hotel.

[spongebob]

Thanks for that Sternchallis, it certainly shows him in another light but his parsimony did exist in NZ and may well of been due to his insight of things to come with NZ's relationship and the EU.
Stuart Bricklebank, a class mate of mine at school sailed with Blue star in the 1950's and eventually became Chief Engineer of Vesty's Tomoana works in Hawkes Bay told me many a story of financial curbs as did other works engineers .
In the 60's he sent his son and heir to NZ to 'learn the trade' and I recall photos in the local press showing the lad working as a knife hand on the slaughter chain.
Painting the propellor shaft! I agree with him there , it's gleam was as important as the engine room brass .

Bob

[duncs]

'Blue Star' on the label, fvck all on the table!
Bad feeders.

[Rosels]

I was C/E of an opposition meat processing plant and was visiting the Vesty Fielding Works on the day Vesty pulled the pin. The C/E was looking out his office window admiring the just completed asphalted carpark when a big merc drove over it leaving bloody big wheel ruts in thesurface. The chief met the guy at the front door and started to bollock him for ignoring the no parking and stay off signs. The guy interrupted the chief and said don't you worry about this anymore because as of now I am in charge....he was the receiver. A sad part of the Vesty debacle was that most of the loyal hard working engineers had accumulated large amounts of leave that they never got paid for by the receivers. There was huge overcapacity of processing facilities at the time the Vesty works went,

[sternchallis]

Originally Posted by duncs

'Blue Star' on the label, fvck all on the table!
Bad feeders.

What year and what ships would that be?
I was there 73-83 and I cannot say I went hungry. On the Wellington Star in 74 with white crew, the Engineers steward was drunk at Breakfast so by dinner he was in no fit state to serve, but could well have been from the pool.

[sternchallis]

Spongebob 16.

Yes the EU has a lot to answer for, hopefully if Boris gets in we can give them the Churchill salute and restore trading with our Commonwealth.
Trouble is the youngsters these days would have trouble finding it on a map and we don't have a Merchant Navy to facilitate trade.

That young Vestey, is Robin who runs Vestey Foods with Roland his cousin (I assume). They buy exotic high price foodstuffs from around the world, but leave somebody else to ship it. https://www.vesteyfoods.com/

Robin attends all the Blue Star and Vestey group reunions either Uk or AusKiwi. He normally stands up and has something to say on whats going on. The reunions are mainly seagoing staff with the odd office type from the commercial side.
Think there is one in ChCh in two years. From all accounts the AusKiwi one are 2 days and a night affairs and go quite well, but the UK one is full of crusty old men a third of them calling themselves Captain & Mrs ********* who hadn't commanded a ship in 40+ years, the wives wearing the gold braid and scrambled egg if talking to other wives. Not a congenial atmosphere.
There was only one Master whose name tag said Mr******, and so they all should.

[duncs]

74/75 'Montevideo Star', ex 'Newcastle Star'. Great crowd. Grub? sh1t. I can't really elaborate on that, except that we managed to get access to the fridge(don't ask how), and had bacon sannies at night.

[duncs]

Further to my above, we were in Marseilles(I think), on xmas day(under P&O GCD), when in the afternoon, four Blue Star cadets/apprentices came on board. We told them to go to the saloon, where there was a cold bouffie, and to help themselves. They did, and were amazed. It was better than their xmas dinner!

[sternchallis]

Duncs,

If any ships were going to be bad feeders, then those on the South America run would be, especially if the OM and grocer were on there permanent. It would appear there was alsorts of fiddles going on selling ships stores to the locals, but on reefer tramping or Kiwi to the US there was no market in fact it was probably cheaper ashore.
On white crew ships everybody would eat the same food, perhaps its how its presented and if the grocer was a bit of a plonky then the cooks might be able to get away with stuff.

I remember on the old Welly we had a cargo of frozen lamb from Kiwi plus all the offal as well, so that would often appear on the menu, sweet breads, kidneys , livers, no doubt cargo brand.
There was three levels there, Passenger saloon, officers saloon and the crews mess, so food could be iffy in the crews mess. Think the ships complement was 50 as she was all plugs and beams 7 hatches as the boat deck opened up, twin screw, so a lot down below. Ships past their prime.
On the Rocky they had Chinese, so there were a lot more of them but they earnt less, but the cost to the ship was the same as white crew. She had 3 galleys. The main galley for the officers and stewerds, Deck galley and Greasers galley as they were from different parts so ate different food and so there was a seamans cook/ boy and a greasers cook/boy.
I was told always to order a different egg each breakfast orherwise they would have yours cooked off sat drying up , rather than cooked fresh.
There were a few things that they couldn't just get right. The steaks were soaked in garlic cloves ok if you liked garlic and had no friends.

Yet if we were carrying fruit, you never saw any. We carried NZ cheese up to Philadelphia and Galveston and somebody got a case out of the hold, it tasted awful, bit like soap, but then the Yanks wouldn't know then what good cheese tasted like.
If we carried bananas or apples, we never saw any of them and when fruit did get served up it was dried out as it had been too long in the cold stores.

We used to say to the cadets to get stuck in to their food as it was part of their wages and being growing lads in their late teens.

[duncs]

I'll go along with all you say, SternC. You needed a good frostie to get the good stuff up, bypassing the grocer.

[jimg0nxx]

I did 15 months on America Star on the East Coast North America - Australia run. Must say don't ever remember any complaints about feeding, I would even say it was very good.