El capitán de la marina mercante José Ricart y Giralt (1847-1930): una aproximación a la historia marítima contemporánea de Barcelona

Abstract

We refer to Barcelona as a maritime city, but we ignore almost everything about the cultural foundations of this view. Ignorance is much greater as we approach the last two centuries. The main objective of this thesis is to review some of the events of recent maritime history to provide food for thought. In my opinion there is nothing worse than a culture based on false myths. Misconceptions that are often provoked by ignorance. Contemporary maritime history of Barcelona is a wasteland. The only exception is the study of economic history undertaken by Pierre Vilar. Should also clarify that the term "maritime history" encompasses many aspects, no systematic to date, which could be grouped into three areas: scientific, technical and human. Few studies have attempted to establish connections between them. Talk in global terms about "maritime" was one of the objectives of my thesis. But I will not hide that, whenever I could, I tried to prioritize the human aspect. The method I tried to follow consisted in establish a central element and supporting other aspects about it that I thought were important and affordable. The core of the thesis is a biography of José Ricart (paragraph 4), a key figure in recent maritime history. Other aspects are: science illustration (section 1), a review of various aspects of maritime life in Barcelona (paragraph 2), a reflection on the implementation of industrial technology in ships (paragraph 3) and a detailed analisys of the events that took place during the thirties of last century (Section 5). A significant element of this work is the story of the Nautical School which doesn¿t hace an specific section, but takes part in all of them. Conclusions refer to four aspects. First, we discuss the "maritime dimension" of Barcelona. The capital of the region more like a ¿riverside¿ city. I have also worked to highlight the hard work at sea and to highlight the many myth-making that have been made. In this regard, much work remains to be done. The Nautical School of Barcelona is presented as the midship section of the local and national maritime culture. Finally, it discusses the historical importance of José Ricart and denounce attempts to fall again in the myth. The chronicle of Franco's repression on merchant marine¿s republicans from Barcelona seems fair to me, because of the silence that has prevailed on this issue so far. This, and the fate of those who chose to join the Republican Naval Reserve, are lines of work I would like to continue in the future. In general, it should be noted that the idea raises many questions and points out the need to open new lines of research. Refering to the sources, I believe that, except in the first paragraph which have more secondary sources, the thesis is based on primary sources. In the case of Jose Ricart, monitoring of their work has been very time consuming because of the predominance of articles and short essays, as well as the diversity of platforms on which them were published. I have separated his referentes to the rest in the bibliography.