In April 1956, a refitted oil tanker carried
fifty-eight shipping containers from Newark to Houston. From that
modest beginning, container shipping developed into a huge industry that
made the boom in global trade possible.
The Box tells the
dramatic story of the container's creation, the decade of struggle
before it was widely adopted, and the sweeping economic consequences of
the sharp fall in transportation costs that containerization brought
about.
Published on the fiftieth anniversary of the first
container voyage, this is the first comprehensive history of the
shipping container. It recounts how the drive and imagination of an
iconoclastic entrepreneur, Malcom McLean, turned containerization from
an impractical idea into a massive industry that slashed the cost of
transporting goods around the world and made the boom in global trade
possible.
