How the Container Conquered Trade

In April 1956 Malcolm McLean loaded 58 containers aboard the converted tanker Ideal X at Port Newark and sailed for Houston, cutting cargo costs dramatically. Within two decades breakbulk cargo nets, stevedore gangs, and weeks in port gave way to gantry cranes and 24 hour turnarounds.

Tokyo, Oakland, Rotterdam, and Felixstowe raced to build the first container berths. Ships grew from hundreds of TEU to the 24,000 TEU giants of today, and ports dredged channels and built megaterminals to take them.

Roughly 80 percent of world merchandise trade by volume now moves in boxes.