A grand piece of U.S. history is soon to be destroyed—shall the United States’ greatest ship be condemned to the depths?
Commentary
The last remnants of
Pennsylvania Station were destroyed in 1966. More than six decades have passed and many Americans still mourn its loss. I was born 15 years after the station was torn down and therefore never had to witness its destruction. My regret is never having had the opportunity to take in its grandeur. This regret has only elevated my gratitude that
Grand Central Terminal did not suffer the same fate. These two New York City locations are two separate tales with one distinct moral.
The moral is that we must cherish the beautiful and the wonderful, especially those things created by our own hands. Americans adhered to this moral between the destruction of one glorious piece of U.S. history and the salvation of another. The
National Historic Preservation Act was passed in 1966—too late to save Pennsylvania Station, but in time to save Grand Central Terminal. By the goodness of well-meaning Americans and the efforts of Congress, historical landmarks across the nation have been protected through this Act, ensuring that we will be able to see, touch, and enjoy the accomplishments and creations of past Americans.
Another piece of American posterity again hangs in the balance. The SS United States, the fastest ocean liner ever built and a testament to American naval ingenuity, appears doomed to meet the same fate as Pennsylvania Station. Earlier this year, she was towed to Mobile, Alabama, where she is to be
stripped and then sunk off Florida’s Gulf Coast to become an artificial reef.
Christened and launched in 1951, the SS United States burst onto the scene as the golden age of ocean liners was nearing its end. This golden age could hardly have ended better, as she broke the trans-Atlantic speed record on her maiden voyage between July 3 and July 7, 1952.
Of course, we have been promised by this current administration that we will soon enter the Golden Age of America. This new age will reprise the power, grandeur, and ingenuity of the American worker and inventor. It will be a time to build up, rather than tear down. As America prepares herself, in all hopeful optimism, to enter this new era of economic prosperity, technological achievement, and a return to the rich pride of our forebears, I pray that we look not solely to the promising future, but that we also contemplate the days of our wondrous past.
William Francis Gibbs is part of that wondrous past. Born during America’s Gilded Age in 1886, he grew up obsessed with ships. It was during a time when America’s Navy was not the pride of the seas, as she is today. But the Navy was guided by good and wise men, like Stephen B. Luce and Alfred Thayer Mahan, who understood the importance of naval supremacy. Certainly, American naval supremacy could never have taken place without the likes of Luce and Mahan, or the likes of George Dewey and Theodore Roosevelt. But what about Gibbs? What was his contribution to American naval supremacy? Was his importance simply in the design and construction of the world’s fastest ship? Nay. His contribution to our maritime legacy concerns more than traveling in style and comfort.
It was his early design ideas that placed him as part of the Shipping Control Committee of the General Staff of the U.S. Army during World War I, as well as part of the U.S. Shipping Board on the American Commission to Negotiate Peace during the 1919 peace process in Paris. His design and construction of the
SS Malolo in 1926 set a new standard in design features throughout the globe. His grand ship, the SS America, at 723 feet long, was christened by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt on Aug. 31, 1939. Fortunately, she was designed to also be refitted as a troop ship, for which she was used during World War II.
Gibbs’s shipbuilding company, Gibbs & Cox, which had designed and constructed the SS America, would be hired to design 70 percent of the U.S. Navy’s ships. His company helped mass produce those unforgettable and utterly necessary
Liberty ships. Additionally, Gibbs & Cox improved upon the Farragut-class destroyer by designing the Mahan-class destroyer.
When the war ended, Gibbs returned to his decades-long dream to build “the fastest ship in the world.” This beautiful and brilliantly designed ocean liner broke the mold on ship design. She was completely fire resistant—from the hull to her drapes. She was also primarily built of aluminum, which significantly lightened her tonnage. For comparison, the SS United States was only 29 feet shorter than the famous
HMS Queen Mary, but was 30,000 gross weight tons lighter. Her engines, capable of 240,000 horsepower, exceeded the Queen Mary by 80,000 horsepower. She was capable of covering 10,000 nautical miles without refueling. The 990-foot long SS United States unequivocally became queen of the oceans, leaving all others in her wake.
She carried the likes of Walt Disney, John Wayne, Marilyn Monroe, Cary Grant, Marlon Brando, Bob Hope, and Prince Rainier and Grace Kelly. Of the First Families, the Eisenhowers, Trumans, and Kennedys enjoyed her power, speed, and style.
There was, indeed, no ship like her. Certainly, there can never be another ship like her, for even if another was made in her image, that ship could never possess what SS United States possesses: history. The SS United States is a landmark to our naval legacy. She is part of our proud history, and she now sits condemned to a fate unworthy of her status. Unworthy of the man who designed her. Unworthy of those who graced her decks. Unworthy of the legacy she established. And unworthy of the Golden Age she represents. If we are to enter this new Golden Age of America, shall we not bring with us our Golden Ages past? Shall we not tie ourselves to the mast of our posterity as we sail into our future?
If we could, would we not change the result of Pennsylvania Station? Who among us does not crave that long lost chance to board a train within that magnificent depot? But we cannot. She is gone. The SS United States, however, is still with us. She
can be saved and restored, and we can sail her again as testament to not only our American ingenuity, but to our gratitude for that historic ingenuity. She can become a ship like no other. She would be more important than a ship of the future. She would be a ship of the past. A vessel that would allow us to travel through our history and recall the glory of a past Golden Age as we sail into the Golden Age of our future.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
