Paper Monitor
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
Maritime history is not a strong suit of your average journalist these days, so when the Cutty Sark went up in flames on Monday morning, there must have been some frantic boning up to be done… except at the Independent, which simply drafted in the curator of the Cutty Sark Trust to write its front page story.
A cheeky tactic but then the pitfalls of trying to bluff one's way in nautical expertise is a perilous, ahem, tack…
"[the Cutty Sark] achieved a record-breaking wind-powered voyage from Australia to England - 67 days in 1885 via Cape Horn" - the Times.
"The 280ft vessel… was once the world's fastest tea clipper sailing from Australia to England in a record 72 days in 1885" - the Daily Mail.
"Named after a fleet-footed witch in the Scottish legend of Tam O'Shanter" - the Daily Mail.
"Cutty Sark - which means 'short skirt'" - the Financial Times.
"The name, meaning short shift or nightdress in Scots dialect" - the Daily Telegraph.
"Willis named his ship Cutty Sark and embellished her with a figurehead of the witch of Robert Burns's Tam O'Shanter, wearing the skimpy blouse called a Cutty Sark" - the Times.
"On the bow is the motto: "Where there's a Willis a way" - the Daily Mirror.
"Jock Willis, the shipowner whose motto 'where there's a Willis a way" adorns the stern" - the Financial Times.
"Eventually the ship came to rest in Greenwich, where it has sat since 1953" - the Guardian.
"[The] Preservation Society… had it floated in a dry dock in Greenwich in 1954" - the Daily Telegraph.
"It has been visited by more than 16 million people" - the Daily Telegraph
"More than 15 million visitors have boarded Cutty Sark…" - the Times.