Deckchair

During the Middle Ages, the folding chair was widely used as a liturgical furniture piece – part of the standing of a bishop was his cathedra (official chair or throne), which was housed in his cathedral (church which housed his throne) – but, since his duties inevitably meant him travelling around his diocese from time to time, an easily transportable version of his cathedra was a standard part of his luggage.

[2] In England, John Thomas Moore (1864-1929) took out a patent for adjustable and portable folding chairs in 1886, and started manufacturing them in Macclesfield.

[4] Early versions of the deck chair were made of two rectangular wooden frames hinged together, with a third rectangle to maintain it upright.

During the golden age of ocean liner travel, the deckchairs upon ships' decks were sometimes reserved for particular passengers for whom crew would attach a paperboard name tag to the wicker seat-back.

[3] The hiring out of deckchairs, on an hourly or daily basis, became established in British seaside resorts, often for use on piers and promenades, in the early 20th century.

[5] In one of the largest English resorts, Blackpool, 68,000 deckchairs were rented out in 2003, at £1.50 a day, but tourism officers suggested that they should be phased out, except on the piers themselves, because they were a reminder of the era of "cloth caps", and had "had their time in the 50s and 60s".

The phrase, "rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic" amplifies on it by implying that someone is overly concerned with unimportant minutiae during a crisis.