Page 8: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (October 2003)

Maritime Meanings

LASSIE In itself, Lassie is not a nautical term, but the name of this famous collie has an interesting connection with maritime his- tory. The first British battleship to be torpe- doed by a German submarine was HMS

Formidable, sunk just off Portland Bill in the

English Channel in 1915. A few hours after ther sinking, some fishermen found the body of a seaman that had been washed ashore in Lyme Bay; they carried it to West

Bay and laid it out on the floor of the Pilot

Boat Inn, and out of decency, covered it with a tarpaulin. However, the dog belonging to the landlord of the inn kept pulling aside the tarpaulin and licking the face of the dead seaman. Despite every discouragement, the dog persisted until the landlord was forced to see for himself what the dog had appar- ently known all along: that the seaman was not yet dead. The man was revived, and that is the end of his part in this story.

Eventually, though, the incident inspired the famous film featuring the collie who won the hearts of millions of children the world over for her bravery, loyalty and intelligence. The point of this anecdote is that the dog was named after the survivor of the sinking of

HMS Formidable, John Lassie.

Source: An Ocean of Words: A Dictionary of Nautical Words and Phrases, by Peter D.

Jeans; Birch Lane Press , 1998

Leading Off

Ultimate Underwater Aid

Is it the Good Ship Lollypop? No, but pictured is

Shirley Temple and RAdm. Howard L. Vickery (second from left) during a Calship yard inspection in July of 1943. The yard, which employed 42,000, had to this date built more than 200 Liberty Ships.

Cartoon

With no offense intended to makers of underwater surveillance equipment, it is difficult to top the capabilities of the

Navy's trained dolphins, which have been employed extensively to help clear mines and keep ships and crew safe in the Iraq War. Pictured is one of the Mark

Six swimmer defense dolphins, deployed to the Arabian Gulf to provide operational force protection capabilities for Navy ships, piers and other high- value assets as part of the global war on terrorism. The dolphins are trained to detect, locate and mark threat swimmers and divers attempting to commit terror- ist attacks. (U.S. Nav\ photo by Photographer's Male 2nd Class Veronica Birmingham) " r/t OT#c*IT_ .. /'c euezz. " (See Pilot Boats on page 72)

See us at World Maritime Technology Exposition (SNAME), Booth No. 302

Circle 282 on Reader Service Card "The Name Says It All."

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