Tight

[E.Martin]

Most seamen were very liberal but i did meet up with some tight ones,one particular one reckoned that he did not smoke,never bought any but always took one and smoked it when he was offered.
Another time i did see a person putting his tooth paste tube through the washing machine mangle.
Another wore his working jeans through the Med,going through Suez he cut them down to shorts,Red Sea,Arabian Sea, Persian Gulf,Kuwait loaded then back to the Canal where he sewed back the bit he had cut off.
There must be alot more similar stories.

[Les Woodard]

LOL so you also know Terry (Masthead) then. That was one of his lurks but he sewed on zips to his dungaree's so that he could do it all the time as the weather changed.

[happy daze john in oz]

In the days before the zip became the order of the day there was a cook who used to remove all the fly buttons on his checks. When asked why he replied that he did not want to miss an opportunity while undoing them.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

Hi E? Martin
I only came across one tight bloke[ no pun intended] When i was on the NZ coast we used to be paid half monthly the the rest at the end of the month whether we were in NZ Aus or wherever. This paticular bloke who's name I will always remember used to borrow from someone at the half month them borrow at the end of the month to pay back the first bloke, in the meantime banking his own wages, didn't take long for the crew to wake up but he did it for the first month on every ship he joined.
Cheers Des

[Louis the Amigo]

Hi E. martin hi Les Hi happy john in oz, hi Shipmates, I met at sea, many who were frugal or tight with money and stuff, many had very sad tales', to tell why they were like that, Grew up with nothing, refugees'', prison camps . and many other reasons' But the person who was the meanest? to himself was a{ scotsman} no offence meant to any on this forum, Some of his antics collect all odd bits of soap in washroom to do his dobbie, never drank any strong drink unless it was free or ration i.e rum , ciggs ends he would collect and roll his own , but very rare he left ship " too expensive" He had no family? and many years later I found out he died in a sea mans mission and left them a very large sum. So he made someone happy at his end.

[alf corbyn]

gi lads one ship i was on we had a bloke who didn't smoke but always accepted a cig when offered. he would put it in his tin and walk off without lighting it. he freely admitted that when he got to a likely port he would swap them for goods. his theory was they were freely given whether he smoked them or traded them.he had a point i think. cheers. alf

[Albert Bishop]

Morning all, Twelve month on a tanker, and we had two Scotish brothers who didn't drink or smoke, never drew subs, and I'm pretty sure they never went ashore, I'm also pretty sure they never spent any money in all that time. Not tight. they were a couple of great lads, and were only at sea untill they had earned enough money to buy a farm. With such dedication, I hope they made it. Cheers Albi.

[E.Martin]

Zips on trouser legs in the fifties,I first saw them in Thailand in the nineties,if he had took the patent on them way back ,he might have made a fortune.

[Phil Crawley]

In day's when you had to pay the the cook for your grub home trade, the cook on an IOMSPCo cargo boat that ran from Douglas to Liverpool told me he had two AB brothers whose sister would make them enough sandwich's to get them there and back, they brought their own tea sugar and milk and avoided paying for anything, when the docker's went on strike in Liverpool, and the sandwich's ran out these two came to the galley for their eats, it gave the cook great satisfaction to say, ****off and get your sister to send some air mail sandwich's, they still didn't pay for anything as they had a nephew on the IOM ferry which was not affected by the strike, who brought them eats every other day.
Phil Crawley.

[Alex Thomson]

Tight chief stewards - I sailed with one on the HELISOMA; he was known as "Ration book Barnett"