KAWASAKI KISEN K.K.

K79 is the parent company’s flag, used by the group. Its funnel was adopted in 1919 and replaced that August. Jorge Candeias’s FOTW flag replaced Al Fisher’s earlier image, which had been mislabelled Kawasaka Kisen.

K80 replaced the initial funnel in August 1919.

The K174/K32 funnel dates from the 1921 K Line joint service. The red flag with a white K shown as K174 by several interwar sources was, according to company confirmation, never used. Brown 1926 brackets the participating companies, but Rosanoski says Kokusai had its own livery and was included because of the joint service. Lloyd Reederieflaggen instead attributes the disputed flag to Kokusai. FOTW retains it among erroneously reported images.

The company also denied that K33 ever existed. Rosanoski suggests that an obscured narrow funnel base caused the error. Nevertheless, Ships & The Sea 1936 says K174 replaced it, and US Navy 1961 and the Japanese Shipowners Association reproduce it. Those documentary discrepancies remain explicit.

Watt originally dated K34 to new motor vessels in the 1950s, spreading later through the fleet. Its appearance in Merchant Ships 1942 led him to correct the date to before 1942, probably the late 1930s. The deep red top did not shrink on shorter funnels; the base became shallower. Stewart 1963 shows a smaller red top, although still larger than usual. Later photographs document K34 on Ems Highway, Alessandro Volta and Greenwich Bridge, the last presumably chartered from the Doun Kisen ownership context.

Watt places K81 with associates in the 1950s and 1960s, adding the top to their normal funnels. Rosanoski notes a pre-war use not mentioned by Watt. A black-and-white Holland Maru photograph shows a different arrangement: base and black top separated by a white and unidentified lighter-coloured biband. Watt suggests a possible misreading of Talbot-Booth’s grey base.

FOTW presents K383 among erroneously reported images. No documentary source is given or known to Rosanoski.

Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, also Kawasaki Steamship and K Line, was formed at Kobe in April 1919. The K Line joint service began in 1921 with Kawasaki Zosen and Kokusai Kisen, taking its name from the three K initials; the latter two later reduced their capital involvement. JAL followed in November 1925 with Kokusai and Yamashita, and the Kawasaki North Pacific Express Line in January 1926. Shares were publicly listed in January 1950. An agreement with Iino was signed on 20 December 1963 and the merger followed in April 1964, retaining the K Line name. The domestic division became Kawasaki Kinkai Kisen in May 1966; the US affiliate became K Line New York in April 1967. Seven Seas Cruise Lines was established in September 1989. Many vessel names end in kawa.

Japan, Tokyo and Kobe.