A VERY interesting article on Henry Bell and the Comet was published in the Guardian on Saturday July 28 2012.
Ian Jack writes that thanks to Bell's efforts, the Comet was recognised as the first commercially successful steamship in Europe, enabling Bell to claim his title as the father of steam navigation, and thus a leading figure among the Britons, and particularly Scotsmen, who shaped the modern world.
Despite that, he writes, Bell has joined shipbuilding on the Clyde as a thing of the past. The article can be accessed here.