50 years of Containers: How a box transformed the world

[dldance]

On April 26, 1956, 58 aluminum containers were loaded onto a welded steel frame above the deck of the Ideal-X in Newark. Five days later the ship steamed into Houston and the boxes were trucked to their destinations – the first container shipment.

According to a Financial Times article by Marc Levinson, this is one of the most important dates in economic history as the container transformed economic geography.

According to a 1959 Harvard study, “containerization would barely affect the New York region, because it’s products were not transport sensitive.” Now manufacturing has moved away from the waterfront – tied there by cheap transportation – and moved to new locations with room to handle containers – including Korea and China.

A 1967 study suggested that 5 container ships could handle all the demand between the US and Britain. These experts had not idea of how much trade would expand as the cost of trading dropped.

US railroad sfought containerization, turning away container shipments because, “they would destroy the business of carrying manufactured goods in boxcars. …Not until the 1990s did they begin to recoup the business they lost in the 1960s – traffic that approaches 12 million carloads a year,” and is the railroads most lucrative business.

Marc Levinson is the author of The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger.

dd

[adrianspeeder]

Pretty amazing how things change.

Adrianspeeder

[FJ and G]

A trucker named Malcom (sic) invented the modern-day container. He died just a few years ago. RRs, btw, were slow to piggyback onto the concept. It is becoming somewhat popular nowadays, tho.

[Anonymous]

Thats a huge understatement on the line between Barstow and Mojave thats I ever see!

[FJ and G]

K, did a quick search and turned up an accurate article (I used to be a Sea Power magazine associate editor who did an article on this matter):

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/theymadeamerica/whomade/mclean_hi.html

[Anonymous]

Ahem*

Pallets. Friends... pallets.