# Why are old ships logs (apparently) a highly desired item on eBay? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 8, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185 "2004-05-08T15:50:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/1 "2004-05-08T15:50:47Z")
As much odd stuff as I sell on eBay I’m hardly one to talk, but in the course of researching prices for a newish pair of black Effingham riding boots I was going to list, I ran across this listing for [“SS EFFINGHAM CARGO SHIPS LOG 1914-1926”](http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=423&item=2242094856&rd=1) and it has two bids and is already up to $ 51.00! I appreciate esoteric interests as much as anyone but this seems to be pushing the envelope. What is the interest with old ships logs? What historical interest could they possibly contain other than a collection of cargo lists? > [@](#): > > A NICE PIECE OF HISTORY. A SHIPS LOG FOR THE SS EFFINGHAM. DATES FROM 1914-1926 IN MANY DIFFERENT ENTRIES. SHIP CRUSIED AROUND THE WORLD BUT MAINLY TO SOUTH AMERICA AND GERMANY. LISTS PORTS ENTERED AND LONGITUDE AND LATITUDE OF SAILING. BASED OUT OF THE GULF OF MEXICO THE CARGO SHIP MADE MANY CROSS OCEAN TRAVELS. COVER IS WORN BUT LOG PAGES GOOD AND CLEAR. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/2 "2004-05-08T16:03:05Z")
I think some people have vicarious experiences reading the old logs, just as they do while reading a good book. They see themselves on the journies, and escape for a while from their boring day-to-day existance. People whose day-to-day lives are not boring may enjoy the connection with what they are doing with what people did 100 years ago. 1914 to 1926. In 1914, America was not yet in WWI. In 1926 the stock market had not yet crashed. Travel in that time was an adventure. You couldn’t just get on a jet and fly to Europe in eight hours. You had to spend many days on a ship. Or if you wanted to fly to the South Pacific you rode in a flying boat that made stops in remote places like Hawaii or Midway. Quite different from showing up at an airport, slogging your way through security checkpoints, and then being given a cramped seat! It was, by today’s standards, a simpler time. No microprocessors. Work was done by machines and muscle. If it was hot, you sweated instead of turning up the air conditioner. If it was cold, you put on layers of heavy clothing instead of PolarTek. Some people’s idea of a vacation is staying in a cookie-cutter hotel and laying by the poole (which is only yards away from a perfectly good ocean). For others, much of the enjoyment comes from the journey. I think that old ship’s logs allow people to imagine travelling in a manner which their modern schedules will not allow. (FWIW, I’ve never read an old ship’s log.) ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/3 "2004-05-08T16:03:47Z")
becasue people collect them. why do people collectany given item? some people collect navel lint, or gum wrappers, or rubber bands. at least you can get a good if boring read out of a cargo log=\ ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/4 "2004-05-08T19:04:45Z")
That particular entry was for a cargo ship, but perhaps the interest can be explained by the Internet-fueled boom in home genealogy. Tracking passenger voyages back to the Old Country, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Doomtrain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/0ea827/32.png) [@Doomtrain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doomtrain)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/5 "2004-05-08T20:20:30Z")
Or perhaps a family member worked as crew on the ship? If I knew my great-grandfather worked on a steamer (or whatever), it might be interesting to have the logbook. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/6 "2004-05-08T20:28:16Z")
I read recently of scientifically useful weather data gleaned from old ship logs. They have more than entertainment/historical value. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/7 "2004-05-08T22:46:29Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > I read recently of scientifically useful weather data gleaned from old ship logs. They have more than entertainment/historical value. IIRC, it was old ship logs which helped disprove the “micro blackhole” theory of what happened at Tunguska was the logs of ships which would have been in the most likely area for the blackhole to have emerged from the Earth. Since none of the logs repeated seeing anything like what happened at Tunguska, it was pretty easy to prove that it couldn’t have been a blackhole. ---
**Author:** ![StGermain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stgermain/32/2868_2.png) [@StGermain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StGermain)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/8 "2004-05-08T23:17:27Z")
What size are the riding boots? Some people are naval-o-philes and like everything about ships. A piece of hardware here, a bit of uniform there, they find it all cool. StG ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/9 "2004-05-09T02:11:25Z")
> [@StGermain](#): > > What size are the riding boots? > > Some people are naval-o-philes and like everything about ships. A piece of hardware here, a bit of uniform there, they find it all cool. > > StG “Style 2000L Size 7 WC” (women’s boot I think but not sure) Looks as if they were worn 3-4 times at most. Apparently top quality riding boots cost hundreds when new, but I’ll list them super cheap I’m thinking 29-39 dollars or so. [Here’s](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/sDCP_1949.JPG) [what](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/sDCP_1957.JPG) [they](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/sDCP_1951.JPG) [look](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/sDCP_1954.JPG) [like](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/svDCP_1963.JPG) ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/10 "2004-05-09T02:29:16Z")
Hi, my name’s Jonathan Chance and I collect old written items. (Everyone say ‘Hi Jonathan’!) Letters, diaries, postcards, terms of indenture, what-have-you. It’s a great way to get a feel for another era to actually have it in someone’s handwriting. Many times people will write things informally that they wouldn’t when they sit down to make notes in a journal or somesuch. I think a log would count the same way. Examples: 1. A civil war era letter I have from a man in some border state (I forget which one) in which he details his reaction to the ‘secess’ (secessionist) women being held at a local prison. He’s quite sympathetic to them personally. 2. A set of five journals from 1941-1945 from a man in Chicago. He spends quite a bit of time in 1941 detailing how he believes the US shouldn’t stand with Britain against the Axis because of the ‘outmoded’ and ‘exploitative’ English class system. Even in the Nazi’s are evil he wants nothing to do with standing side by side with England. And occassionally [something astonishing can happen.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=179092) I think I’m off to ebay! ---
**Author:** ![Doomtrain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/0ea827/32.png) [@Doomtrain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doomtrain)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/11 "2004-05-09T03:37:01Z")
You know, I was just coming back to say, “Besides all that, I think it’s pretty cool in general, though I wouldn’t pay fifty bucks for it.” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/12 "2004-05-09T04:37:53Z")
> [@](#): > > some people collect navel lint Or in this case, **naval** lint? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mapache](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/58956e/32.png) [@Mapache](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mapache)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/13 "2004-05-09T15:53:28Z")
Excuse the nitpick but - Johnny LA said ¨ You couldn’t just get on a jet and fly to Europe in eight hours. You had to spend many days on a ship. Or if you wanted to fly to the South Pacific you rode in a flying boat that made stops in remote places…¨ Actually you couldn´t do that until 1935. (Cite:[http://w1.901.telia.com/~u90113819/archives/flyboats.htm.)](http://w1.901.telia.com/~u90113819/archives/flyboats.htm.)) One of my good friends, who died about three years ago, used to fly the China Clippers. Had some great stories, but that´s even more of a hijack. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-old-ships-logs-apparently-a-highly-desired-item-on-ebay/244185/14 "2004-05-09T16:45:44Z")
> [@](#): > > Excuse the nitpick but - I didn’t mean to imply that one could take the China Clipper in 1926. What I meant was that travel before the Jet Age took longer and was more involved. Sometimes I forget to add stuff I thought everyone knew, like dates and such. _Mea culpa_.