I did start researching wartime liberties, looking for one with a history that struck a chord, as usual I got side-tracked into their post war careers. I knew they formed the backbone of the fleets of the up and coming post war Shipowners, largely Greek, sone Italian, (too many to mention) , a number of these were to become household names.
I started my career ashore in 1986 with Niarchos (London) Ltd, in their shipping department, starting off in Statistics and finished up as a shipbroker.
I knew the there were Liberties in the fleet, long before my time. The shipping side closed down in 2004, the old company was a dead end. I scoured the net, and found one photograph, on a website very strictly copyrighted, so I cannot reproduce it here.
The World Liberty belonged to the Niarchos fleet from 1962 - 64, and was commercially managed through my former office. She was a externally pretty unmodified, except for removal of all the armament and mounts, except for the circular part of the after gun platform, and an enclosed bridge was fitted.
The colour scheme is typical of it's era:-
Black upper hull,
Red antifouling,
White superstructure,
Reddish / brown decks,
Dull yellow masts & vents,
Black mast tops
Black funnel with white / red/white / blue white bands with a black outlined white N, and the same across the bow.
I am not 100% sure, but it is very likely she was under the Red Ensign, and London registered, Either that or Greek flag & Pireaus. Still have time to work on that.
Enough waffle, here is the start.
The Kit,
The Eduard etch,
Quite a lot of it is to do with the armament, but there are many useful bits for the hatches and derrick booms.
First job, filling the locating holes for gun positions on the foredeck.
The underside.
The topside cleaned up and ready for fitting.
The hull basic assembly done, a little filling and sanding to do.
More soon.
Si
