backup blog

The luxury yacht Nahlin was built at John Brown & Co. in Clydebank, the shipbuilders famed for building the Queen Mary and the QE2 and the Lusitania. She was built in 1930 for Lady Yule, the heiress of wealthy businessman Sir David Yule, who had business interests in India. The Nahlin is one of the largest private yachts ever built in the UK and weighs 1,574 tons and is 91metres (300 feet) long Titan Crane at site of Former John Brown Engineering yard Clydebank -  Visit the Crane and go up to the top for a great view! Photo by J.Wilson Amongst her long history, she was chartered by King Edward VIII and used by him and Mrs Wallis Simpson to cruise the Adriatic Sea.  The yacht was bought in 1937 by King Carol II of Romania and renamed Luceafarul and later Libertatea. The monarch abdicated in 1940 and the yacht then had a varied history in Romania up until 2002 when she ended up being taken to Liverpool for Restoration.  She was then purchased by Sir James and Deid...

Finnieston Crane The Titan Crane at Finnieston (adjacent to the SEC complex)  is one of four Titan cranes which have been preserved on the Clyde out of the numerous cranes which used to be seen on the Clyde. The Titans were the biggest!  The Finnieston crane was used to load newly produced railway engines onto ships for shipping worldwide. If you look further down the river, you will see another Titan crane which was situated at the Barclay, Curle & Co.  Clydeholm Yard at Whiteinch.   In 1912, Barclay, Curle & Co. built ship called the Jutlandia ,  for the East Asiatic Company, a Danish business with headquarters in Copenhagen. Two sister ships were built in Denmark at the same time (the first was Selandia). These three were the first large sea-going ships in the world to have diesel engines. Rudolf Diesel , a German, patented his engine in 1892. Almost immediately the Glasgow shipbuilders negotiated a licence and by 1914 had the first works in...