Page 174 - Mellinato, Giulio, and Aleksander Panjek. Eds. 2022. Complex Gateways. Labour and Urban History of Maritime Port Cities: The Northern Adriaticin a Comparative Perspective. Koper: University of Primorska Press.
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plex Gateways
Figure 1. The Harbour Museum Hamburg is located in quay shed 50a
On the museum site, there are large devices like Van Carriers and cranes.
Behind the flood protection wall is the port basin. Credit: Janine Schemmer.
My research began in the Hafenmuseum Hamburg, the local
Harbour Museum, an institution where former dock workers’ memories
are spatially located (Figure 1). Although the municipality runs the mu-
seum, there were only a few permanent employees back then, supported
by student assistants, and I was one of them for several years. Apart from
the directorate, the main protagonists on site as of now are volunteers
and former dock workers, shipbuilding workers, and seamen. During
my working hours, I had the chance to listen to the narrations of the so-
called dock seniors. I established first contacts with interview partners
there, and was soon able to develop further connections. Overall, I col-
lected twenty-five interviews with retired dock workers who began their
careers between the 1950s and 1970s, thus before and after the arrival of
the first full container ship in Hamburg in 1968. Most of the interview-
174
Figure 1. The Harbour Museum Hamburg is located in quay shed 50a
On the museum site, there are large devices like Van Carriers and cranes.
Behind the flood protection wall is the port basin. Credit: Janine Schemmer.
My research began in the Hafenmuseum Hamburg, the local
Harbour Museum, an institution where former dock workers’ memories
are spatially located (Figure 1). Although the municipality runs the mu-
seum, there were only a few permanent employees back then, supported
by student assistants, and I was one of them for several years. Apart from
the directorate, the main protagonists on site as of now are volunteers
and former dock workers, shipbuilding workers, and seamen. During
my working hours, I had the chance to listen to the narrations of the so-
called dock seniors. I established first contacts with interview partners
there, and was soon able to develop further connections. Overall, I col-
lected twenty-five interviews with retired dock workers who began their
careers between the 1950s and 1970s, thus before and after the arrival of
the first full container ship in Hamburg in 1968. Most of the interview-
174
