When genial, canny Edward Phillip Farley stepped out of the chairmanship of the U. S. Shipping Board in 1924, he took with him a lesson World War I had taught him. In that war Norway sold ships to belligerents willing to pay fantastic prices for bottoms to carry their precious foodstuffs and implements of war, collected insurance from Great Britain on chartered ships sunk by submarines and mines. In the lull that peace brought to world shipyards the canny Norwegians rebuilt their merchant marine at rock-bottom prices. Even today 45% of Norway's vessels are less than ten years old—a...
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