Passenger (Ocean) Liners

My interest results from reading two books. Walter Lord's A Night to Remember (1955) awakened me to the fascinating Titanic story when I was growing up, and John Maxtone-Graham's The Only Way to Cross (see below) more recently introduced me to the 20th century story of the trans-Atlantic run. The latter has a bibliography that got me started on another book quest that continues more than 35 years later. My own interests do NOT extend to the modern cruise business, but rather focus on the 1880-1960 period of passenger ocean-going steamships.

The photo above shows the RMS Queen Mary (1936), the Cunard Line Blue Riband holder (1936-1952) now moored near Long Beach, California, where she's been a museum ship since the early 1970s (her final voyage was in 1967). She is probably the most famous single Atlantic liner, and the only one of the classic era that survives. You are looking toward the stern as seen from one of her bridge "wings." (The Queen Mary 2 is twice the tonnage of this classic ship.)

Websites

RMS Titanic Inc. This is the company that has brought up items from the wreck and provided the many museum displays seen here and abroad. The site provides extensive information on the ship and the more recent artifact rescue attempts.

The Ship's List A hard site to categorize, this focuses on emigrant voyages of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but includes a good deal of reference data on the ships and related topics.

Ocean Liner Links Page Just that...lots and lots of links to shipping lines, specific ships, events and the like.

S.S. Independence Our one and only cruise (thus far) was in Hawaii in 2000 as we celebrated our 35 years together in an 800 mile voyage around four of the islands. This service closed down after 9-11. The ship was the half-century old American Export liner that originally served in the New York-to-Italy run. The site offers a brief history.

Andrea Doria: Tragedy and Rescue at Sea Very detailed and well-organized site on the mid-1956 collision south of Nantucket...fog, they said, despite modern radar. More than 50 died and a lovely Italian liner, just three years old, was lost (it is now a diving site, though a dangerous one).

Selected Books

Bonsor, N.R.P. North Atlantic Seaway: An Illustrated History of the Passenger Services Linking the Old World with the New. Jersey, Channel Islands, UK: Brookside Publications, 1975-1980, five vols (rev. ed.). The definitive history and directory of both the many companies and their liners.

Braynard, Frank O. Leviathan: World's Greatest Ship. New York: South Street Seaport Museum/American Merchant Marine Museum, 1972-1983 (6 vols). Surely the most detailed history for any one ship (she sailed from 1914 into the mid-1930s), written by a long-time maritime reporter and author.

Brinnin, John Malcolm. The Sway of the Grand Saloon: A Social History of the North Atlantic. New York: Delacorte Press, 1971. Wonderful and insightful cultural history by a professor of English.

Dawson, Philip. Cruise Ships: An Evolution in Design. London: Conway Maritime Press, 2000. Best serious study of the architectural development of what are now often huge "white boxes" serving thousands of vacationers.

(Ibid). The Liner: Restrospective & Renaissance. London: Conway Maritime Press, 2005. Following on his earlier volume, this offers a wonderfully illustrated survey history of passenger liner design through the decades.

Emmons, Frederick E. American Passenger Ships: The Ocean Lines and Liners, 1873-1983. Newark: University of Deleware Press, 1985. Best one-volume source with simple sketch profiles and annotations for all the lines and ships. This is based in part on his earlier separate books on liners in the Atlantic and Pacific.

Gibbs, C.R. Vernon. British Passenger Liners of the Five Oceans. London: Putnam, 1963. Best one-volume survey when liners still mattered as serious transportation, not merely as cruise ships.

Kludas, Arnold. Great Passenger Ships of the World. Cambridge, England: Patrick Stephens Ltd., 1975-1977, 1986, six vols. Best directory, arranged chronologically, of ships larger than 10,000 tons by a German authority. Given all the recent construction of cruise ships, we need an additional volume!

(Ibid). Record Breakers of the North Atlantic: Blue Riband Liners 1838-1952. London: Chatham Publishing, 2000. A handsome survey with good ship profile color drawings. Great place to begin reading.

Maxtone-Graham, John. The Only Way to Cross. New York: Macmillan, 1972. The book that hooked me on the topic--delightfully written from the launch of Mauretainia (1907) to the Queen Elizabeth 2 (1969). Still among my favorite books--and it's remained in print for more than 30 years.

(Ibid). Liners to the Sun. New York: Macmillan, 1985. Rise of cruise ships--and how they differ from traditional ocean liners.

(Ibid). Crossing and Cruising From the Golden Era of Ocean Liners to the Luxury Cruise Ships of Today. New York: Scribner's, 1992. Something of a reprise of his two books above--delightfully written social history.

Ocean Liners of the Past. Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1970s (6 vols). These are reprints of very detailed Shipbuilder engineering magazine special issues published at the launch of suchimportant liners as Mauretania-Lusitania (1906), Titanic-Olympic (1912), Aquitania (1914), Empress of Britain (1931), Normandie (1935), and the Queen Mary (1936). Even these reprints are all now collector's items.

Tate, E. Mowbray. Transpacific Steam: The Story of Steam Navigation from the Pacific Coast Of North America to the Far East and the Antipodes, 1867-1941. New York: Cornwall Books, 1986. Best history of the "other" ocean crossed by passenger ships.

Turner, Robert D. The Pacific Empresses: An Illustrated History of Canadian Pacific Railway's Empress Liners on the Pacific Ocean. Victoria, BC: Sono Nis Press, 1981. Lovely book–one of my favorites. Covers the pre-World War II passenger services from Canada (Vancouver) that were never revived at the end of the war.