We’ve all heard about the Titanic and its well-known story, and for those of us ocean
liner enthusiasts, we know of many more like the RMS Queen Mary, RMS Oceanic, SS Rex, and several
other ships that were once very famous. Although, few people today know what ocean liners are and
assume they were the cruise ships of the 19th and 20th centuries, but that is actually far from the truth.
Here now is a brief story of what ocean liners are, and why they all but disappeared.
Before the wide use of steamships, travelers and immigrants sailed to new lands aboard masted
sailing ships. The journeys often took over a month and were so dangerous, there was a big chance you
might never reach your destination, but for many people, that was a risk they were willing to take.
Samuel Cunard had intended to use steam technology to create a steamship company that could transport
passengers in speed and safety. He wanted to make ocean travel accessible to more people,
and not only that, he had a dream of establishing a regularly scheduled transatlantic crossing to
the United States. Up until then, there were no regularly scheduled crossings,
you booked whichever sailing ship was available, and only God could determine your arrival date.
Samuel Cunard established Cunard Steamships Limited and in 1840,
his company had their first steamship ocean liner, the Britannia. A paddlewheeler with
sailing masts in case of emergency. It made its crossing from Liverpool, England to Halifax,
Nova Scotia in 12 days and 10 hours, cutting the fastest sailing ship voyage in half.
The proven success of steamship technology eventually led to a ship-building boom, with
new shipping companies opening and establishing themselves with new fleets of vessels.
Cunard’s greatest rival on the Atlantic would become the White Star Line, but rivalries
weren’t just about speed and safety, they also became about luxury. The end of the Victorian
era saw a quick succession of faster, larger, more luxurious ships being built. All of them
were intended to transport passengers across the seas to their destinations come rain or sunshine.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, steamship passengers only traveled out of
necessity, tourism wasn’t yet affordable to the average working class. And so anyone who
stepped aboard an ocean liner, was not doing so for fun or amusement. In fact,
most passengers did not like being out at sea, they didn’t like the way the ships rolled in
the water, or the harsh and nasty storms. Part of the luxury of being on an ocean liner was
that they were eventually built to be like the finest hotels you could find on land,
all the interiors were designed to distract you from the fact that you were out at sea.
Notice that these early ocean liners did not have balconies overlooking the ocean, nor did
they have large windows for panoramic views. Visit the Queen Mary for instance and you’ll
see that even in the 1930’s the public rooms on the ship only had windows for providing daylight,
but the portholes and windows were often covered by decorative frosted glass or
even curtains that permitted daylight in, but blocked views of the ocean.
While Ocean Liners were not built for cruising and entertainment, there was more and more emphasis
on the entertainment aspect of these ships over the years. Passengers didn’t want to be cooped up
in their staterooms through the entire voyage, so the ship’s often passed out daily programmes that
listed the entertainment available, often it was classical music performances by the ship’s band,
or later on down the line, ship’s like the Queen Mary had cinemas for viewing the latest movies.
In the early 20th century the United States had put harder restrictions on immigration,
this led to a steady decrease in the amount of passengers that steamships were carrying. However
that decrease was soon followed in the 1920’s by leisure travel. Tourism was experiencing an uptick
and people were often crossing the oceans to visit foreign lands. But even still, the ocean liners
were only a means of travel, the ships themselves were not considered the highlight of the trip.
At least not until the prohibition era in the United States. Laws were passed banning
the sale and consumption of alcohol, and many Americans sought the refuge of booze cruises
to take them out into international waters where they could enjoy libations and mingle with others.
This was the birth of the cruise ship, because in this instance, the ship itself was the reason for
booking a voyage. The first cruise ships were not specifically built for cruising,
they consisted of fleets of aging ocean liners from decades past. Ocean Liners did share the
problem of becoming time capsules, not only of design and aesthetic, but of technology as well.
As newer more luxurious ocean liners raced ocross the seas, the older, smaller ones couldn’t
compete and would have otherwise gone to the breakers. So living a few extra years operating
booze cruises may not have been a dignified end, but at least it wasn’t an early end.
Commercial transatlantic flights couldn’t compete with ocean liners until the early 1950’s
when jet engine technology was finally mounted on large, mass-produced aircraft.
Larger planes could haul more people, and the planes could cross the ocean
on the same day they took off. This became a major selling point for air travel because again,
most people traveling by ocean liner were doing so by necessity, not for leisure. So if you could
cut your four-day voyage down to a single-day flight for a much cheaper price, why wouldn’t you?
The decline of the ocean liner industry was rapid and sweeping. The first ships to go were
the oldest ones. Only the more the newer, fuel-efficiant ships remained in service.
Ship’s like the SS United States were still sleek and stylish, and their state-of-the-art
steam engines still allowed them to turn a profit off the ever-dwindling numbers of passengers.
Perhaps ironically, some of the oldest ships still plowing the waters until the late 1960’s were the
RMS Queen Mary and RMS Queen Elizabeth, this was because, despite their aging Art Deco design,
they were still considered luxurious and fast. And the older wealthy clientele they attracted,
weren’t used to flying by airplane, they still preferred transatlantic voyage.
What eventually brought down the two Queens was the expenses relating to their size.
Both ships were so large that they couldn’t fit through the Panama Canal, restricting their
ability to sail more profitable seas, they also required an ever-increasing amount of upkeep,
and lastly, their older boilers were not efficient enough to justify the
costs of sailing with so few passengers. Cunard replaced the two Queens with the newer
RMS Queen Elizabeth 2, also known as the QE2. A ship with the most efficient steam turbine technology
ever put on an ocean liner, and her larger staterooms and powerful air conditioning systems
made her capable of sailing any ocean on the planet, while keeping her passengers comfortable.
Her slightly smaller size also permitted her to sail through not just the Panama Canal
but the Suez Canal as well, increasing the efficiency and speed of her voyages,
and lastly, her slightly shallower draught gave her the ability to sail into tropical ports,
allowing her to spend some of the year as a cruise ship. She was still considered
an ocean liner though, designed to sail the roughest of North Atlantic weather.
Through the 1980’s and 90’s cruise ships continued to grow in popularity,
now, instead of the industry using retired ocean liners, they began building their own custom ships.
They were essentially giant hotel resorts complete with balconies and outdoor swimming pools.
Cruise ship’s didn’t need to be built for sailing the roughest of weather because their voyages
mostly remained along the shallower coastlines and docked in tropical or mild weather destinations.
Cruise ships also serve partly as a destination experience themselves, so there was no need to
install the fastest engines, they were in no particular hurry to get anywhere.
Even today, the Titanic would have still been faster than most modern cruise ships, and could
survive rougher weather than they could. While cruise ships make every attempt to sail around
major storms, ocean liners like the QE2 were built with thicker hull plates and more robust decks in
order to plow through those 70-foot ocean swells.
By the early 2000’s the QE2 was the last
remaining Ocean Liner in service, she still offered her annual transatlantic crossings,
but she was also beginning to show her age. She was succeeded by the Queen Mary 2 in 2004,
the QM2 might look like a typical cruise ship, but she’s actually an ocean liner,
it’s evident not just with her robust design, but in her elongated bow and slender width.
The Queen Mary 2 does cruising most of the year, but does an annual transatlantic run,
carrying on the tradition of her predecessors spanning almost 200 years.
She is the last remaining Ocean Liner in service, and might end up being the last one to ever be built.
From the Britannia in the year 1840, to the Queen Mary 2 of modern-day,
the ocean liner legacy as we have come to know it, begins and ends with Cunard.