The book is directed to the philatelic collector. There are 100+ pages of departure & arrival dates of American packets of the Black Ball, Red Star, Blue Swallowtail, Dramatic, Black X, & Red Swallowtail Lines.

However, the Genealogist will also find it useful.

The text describes briefly each line's history and the ships that sailed during that period. There are also illustrations of covers that those ships carried during this historical period when American packets were the dominant means of communications between the United States, England and the European Continent.

Reviews:
The Collectors' Club Philatelist, July-August 2009, Vol. 88, Number 4, page 251, by Charles Snee:
"North American Packets is an admirable addition to the corpus of literature dealing with the fascinating history of transatlantic mail. The prose is straightforward and accessible. The layout (by the author's wife, Anne) is crisp and uncluttered, and the illustrations are uniformly clear and well-captioned."

Philatelic Literature Review, 2nd Quarter 2010, page 178, by Alan Warren:
"The second table for each line is a chronological listing of departure and arrival dates with the name of the ship and its captain, and pertinent remarks such as weather delays and wrecks, and the first and last voyage. .....Jim Pullin has furnished students of postal history with the tools to analyze their own covers during this period that were sent across the North Atlantic by sailing ships. His research and descriptions will serve collectors for many years."

The Chronicle, 2009

Postal History Journal, 2009

SEE MORE & MORE