The most famous ship in history is unquestionably the RMS Titanic. The ill-fated luxury liner inspired countless books, poems, songs, and movies after striking an iceberg on April 14, 1912, and taking 1,500 passengers to a watery grave. Today, over 100 years after her sinking, the Titanic continues to capture the minds of millions, even though the era of the great Atlantic passenger liners is long behind us. The SS United States, however, remains as a floating reminder of thi

Blog post author Michael G. Jedd is an SS United States Conservancy member. Harry Manning was born in Germany in 1897. He emigrated to the United States at the age of 10 and was educated at the New York Nautical School, currently known as SUNY Maritime Fort Schuyler, and majored in navigation. His first assignment after graduation was navigator aboard the sailing bark Dirigo. Upon U.S. entry into World War I, Manning was re-assigned to the school ship USS Newport, which was

Photo courtesy of Eva Heins A very exciting exhibit is running at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts through October 9th: it's called “Ocean Liners: Glamour, Speed, and Style." The SS United States plays a starring role! Read what Mark Feeney wrote about the event in the Boston Globe: "Some of the names belong to actual rulers of kingdoms or their consorts: Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Elizabeth 2. Other names bespeak great achievement. The Great Eastern l

“You can’t set her on fire, you can’t sink her, and you can’t catch her!” Terrible tragedies befell a number of ocean liners in the 20th century, often resulting in significant injury and loss of life and grabbing international headlines. The sinking of these behemoths of the sea was always a very real possibility, most notably in 1912 when the famed RMS Titanic hit an iceberg in the North Atlantic and fell to the ocean floor. Other ships, such as the SS Morro Castle, went up