ssMaritime.com - Enter a world of Classic Passenger Liners
A short
Introduction:
However, my WebPages on her covers her forerunner, the wonderful S.S.
America which from her very conception in the mid 1930s to her sale to Chandris
Lines in 1964. Thus you will note the relevant are links below. In addition you
will also find a Photo Page showing so much more of her interiors, and another
Page with a complete Deck Plan of the S.S. America as built, revealing the ship
with her original Cabin Class, Tourist and Third Class!
S.S. America & Australis INDEX:
Page One …………… …S.S.
Page
Two Photo Page.
Page Three …………… 1940 Deck Plans.
Page
Four ……………….S.S. Australis History Page from 1964 to
her sad end in 1994.
Page Five ……………….
Brochure & Photo & Page
One.
Page Six ………………….Brochure & Photo Page Two.
Page
Seven …………….Deck Plans.
Enjoy!
Dr. Reuben Goossens.
Maritime Historian, Author
& Lecturer & Cruise'n'Ship Reviewer.
Working for almost 65 years in the Passenger
Shipping Industry,
And as a Maritime Historian,
author and lecturer.
Parts
of this page has been written by Samuel
Elisha.
Due to Dr. Reuben Goossens having
been forced to retire, due to his old age and illness, and as I am an old
friend since the early 1980’s, of both Reuben and his late wife Betty,
may she rest in peace, I will be writing parts of this page, whilst some other
parts will still be by Dr. Reuben Goossens. However, I will always sign off as
follows. S.E.
Introduction:
ssmaritime.com features countless Classic Liners and the occasional cruise ship or
so, as during my extended illness, I was in hospital, when fees were due for “CruiseAustralia”
site. Although being a lover of genuine Liners of days now long gone, I am not
fond of these modern cruise (apartment blocks) ships which are presented as a
part of a ‘New World of Cruising’! I did add some time ago a new page
on the new CUNARD cruise ship M.S. Queen Anne. In the past I was a firm
supporter of Holland America Line, P&O, and certain other cruise lines, etc.
And I cruised with them countless of times, be it on a good number of around
world voyages or one way world sailings, etc. Also countless cruises on almost
all P&O ships (par the Pacific Sky) and my favourite ship based in
Australia was the Ex Holland America ship, renamed the “Pacific Aria”
on which I had countless voyages on! Sadly she is now gone from our shores,
thanks to that rotten Covid. However, my old time favourite at the time was Sitmar’s and
then P&O Australia’s T.S.S. Fairstar, I sailed on her second ever voyage from Melbourne,
Australia to Italy, as well as later countless cruises from Sydney. I have a
great dislike of these huge hiddious big giant floating hotel’s that look
more like a building on a pontoon, with (what an actual designer of a number of
fine liners told me) a sort of hull below these vessels are dimply terrible. You
may ask me, “what was the worst cruise ever”, I have a
very simple answer for that. I sailed on Princess’ first ever around the
world cruise with Princess Cruises on the Pacific Dawn. The ports were very
great, however, some of the ships crew were beyond belief the worst ever, especially
the female entertainment director who was more like a walking foul mouthed monster,
calling passengers all sorts horrible things, even telling them to (f) something
off. Overall the Pacific Dawn voyage was extremely poor and I wrote about it
and I will not sail with Princess even if they gave me a free Suite! However, I
only pay in full for a de-Luxe suite, whenever I go on a cruise, as I never ask
for favours, even though I have provided massive online support, and free
Maritime lectures onboard free of charge!
Dr. Reuben Goossens.
**********************
Please Note: by S.E.
All ssmaritime and other related
maritime sites are 100% non-commercial and privately owned, thus ssmaritime has
NEVER been financially associated with any shipping company or any other
organisation! Although the author has worked and been involved in the passenger
shipping industry for now over 63 years, and he has been a Managing Director of
a major shipping company, as well as an Owner of a Cruise Company. Over
countless years cruise companies would come to him for advice, and that was
from various countries, and he was always happy to assist. Dr. Reuben has been
a very close friend of mine, but sadly he is now 80 years of age and in rather poor
health, thus he forced to retire. Yet, by now he has written on around 1,750
Great Classic Liners, Passenger-Cargo Liners as well as those humble converted
C3 converted Migrant ships, which transported countless thousands of migrants
to the new world! However he also wrote about countless Cruise Ships’ on
his “CruiseAustralia” site that is sadly no longer online. Amazingly, ssmaritime.com has
received 7,579 Billion visitors up to late 2024. Considering this site has been
online since 1991 (although he was writing long before that) and
countless people have visited this site hundred’s of times. This makes up
that huge (to the globe’s number population) of visits, and it
is officially the most visited maritime site in the world! Cunard’s most
famous Commodore from the QE2,
Holland America Line Captains and officers, as well as P&O Captain’s,
and countless crew from the S.S. Oriana, S.S.
Canberra, and countless others well known ships have contacted him. This
includes some of the greatest nautical designers, architects who worked for
Cunard, P&O UK, and other companies from, Holland, Germany, America, Italy
Greece, as well as the Israeli designer of the S.S. Shalom, have written to
Reuben. Many companies desired to place advertising on “ssmaritime.com”,
as well on “CruiseAustralia”, but he always refused, for his main
desire was to retain all his sites as non-profit sites, and desired it to be
100% unbiased! He has been gifted some amazing personally signed liner
designer’s books which are simply amazing (from the actual
designer), and he has always appreciated their kindness and their great
appreciation of his work of almost of so long and being a worldwide known
shipping expert!
However, I trust the features Reuben
has online will continue to provide all Classic Liner enthusiast’s, Crew,
those who have sailed on any of the ships that he has online, and those who
simply love sailing on those wonderful ships that were real Liners, and those
who are true ship enthusiasts and those who are just seeking information. I
trust that ssmaritime.com will in one way or another provide
a great deal of pleasure and that many will relive many happy memories!
S.E.
**********************
I was given permission to state; that
over the years I have been greatly honoured by some of the most famous people
on earth, including an email from the now late H.R.H.
Price Philip, who wrote me to thank Reuben for the feature on the Royal Yacht “Gothic”
on which He and the Her Majesty sailed on in 1952 to 1954.
Some time ago, Dr. Reuben Goossens
discovered a number of ships which he had already started and they were either
close to being completed or they needed to be finished, to date some still
required some work to be done in order to be completed. Of course these were
completed and are all listed on the ssmaritime Index. Thus with my assistance Reuben
was able to bring the last added ships online, for as I would not have been
able to do this all by myself, due to my lack of knowledge. S.E.
There are many emails/letters thanking Dr. Reuben online, and they can be found on Dear Mr. Goossens, there was also an email from Buckingham Palace, which sadly he was unable to publish it, for obvious privacy reasions.
There are countless amazing ships to
be found on the ssMaritime Index (another link is located at the bottom of this page). However, apart from
the S.S. United States above, sadly there are now no more ships to come as Dr.
Reuben Goossens can no longer write any further. I have been his friend and
assistant since the early 1980’s, yet sadly I do not have much knowledge
in regard to the world of shipping, but glad to assist in a small way and
finish what he really had already done. Reuben became a good friend of then
P&O (Carnival’s) Australia’s director Sture Myrmell almost
from when he arrived in Australia from the U.S.A. Since 1958 Reuben
has been on many world voyages and cruises. In addition he was also invited on
various ships to lecture with several companies, however he always paid for his
cruise, and yet he would still give lectures as a paying guest. For he enjoyed
living in a De-Luxe suite, since 2002, he had to use his scooter. I have lost
count of his countless voyages/cruises, but it is well over 200 plus?
*****************************
In
Conclusion by Dr. Goossens:
My dear Friends, this will be my very last
Notice. I hereby whish to say a very special thank you to all my dear ship
lovers from all over the world, for I have been simply astounded that there
have been so many of you reading ssmaritime over and over again, for the
numbers of reader’s simply have more than blown me away! There are so
many who have been reading this site up to a hundred of times for a good 33+
years. In fact this site has now reached over 7.5 Billion visitor’s, that
is really the globe’s entire population, (and my online counter
can’t be wrong), however some ships has some 24 pages, etc. Thus during
all these many years you have been reading and reading, I am always completely
amazed. But I have been so thankful for the countless thousands of the amazing
letters and emails which I have been receiving over the many years, including
one from Prince Philip, may He Rest In Peace, as well a good number of Lord’s
and Sirs. However his H.R.H. wrote me regarding my
feature, (which I am currently updating) on the Royal Yacht ‘Gothic’,
on which H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth and He sailed on. The
voyage was certainly a joy to them both! At this point I can reveal that I
was bestowed with a certain honour when I was in England, but I will not reveal
anything else, for my own reasons, I have also received letters from those who
were famous designers of ship’s and or their interiors, but Naval
Architect’s were most interesting, especially all the details provided
me. There were some of the world’s most famous designers; one
of these was a designer of the S.S. Oriana, and
another of the S.S. Canberra. The list just goes on. Some of the most
famous interior was designers such as my dear friend Sir. Hugh Casson, may he rest in peace, who has not only designed the
interiors of the Canberra, but also Buckingham Palace, as well as the
Royal Yacht “Britannia”.
It is simply beyond my belief that my early rather basic ssmaritime.com became the one of the largest and famous Maritime website in the world, and I certainly feel greatly honoured. Many Captain’s are well known to me, and they have written to me countless times. World famous ship designers who have not only contacted me, but given me their wonderful book’s including the designer of the S.S. Oriana and many other world famous ships! And please remember, that all my maritime & (now past cruise sites) have always been and will remain 100% non-commercial. In addition ssMaritime has been paid well into the 2030’s, thus you can continue to view it and hopefully provide wonderful and joyful memories for past passengers and crew from around the world, as well as those who simply love passenger liners and older cruise ships!
It certainly has been a great joy
for me to present these all the aforementioned for viewers of ssMaritime, and it has been a joy to have been
able to write for so many years having commenced writing in 1982, and I finally
went online in 1991.
As I stated earlier Dr. Reuben
Goossens is now retired due to his poor health, being disabled in addition
he also has poor eyesight, the last item shown at the top of this page, on the
ex S.S. America, and later as the “Australis”
was done with great difficulty. Over the years Reuben has received thousands of Dear Dr. Goossens emails of thanks and today that page contains
a good number of them, but there were countless more.
Best wishes - S.E.
*************************
“Blue Water Liners sailing to the
distant shores.
I watched them come, I watched them go and I watched them die.”
Or ENTER THE SITE's INDEX
HERE
Amazingly: ssmaritime.com has received
The last update was on: Sunday November 24, 2024.
Remember many readers have read different pages & ships hundreds of
times
Also certain features have up to 12 pages and that is a great deal of
reading!
Email: rg@ssmaritime.com
**************************
Where the ships of
the past and the Luxury Cruise Ships of today make history.
The author has been in Passenger Shipping & the Cruise Industry since
1960.
Having been a “Managing Director”, and
has “Operated a Cruise Company”
In addition he was founder of “Save the Classic Liners
Campaign” in 1990.
Please Note: ssmaritime and associated sites are 100% non-commercial and the
author seeks no funding of any shape or
form, never have and never will!
Photographs on ssmaritime and
associate pages are by; the author or from the author’s private
collection. In addition there are some images that have been provided by
Shipping Companies and private photographers or collectors. Credit is given to
all contributors. However, there are some photographs provided to me without
details regarding the photographer/owner concerned, so sorry if this is the
case.
This notice covers all
pages; although, and I have done my best to ensure that all photographs
are duly credited and that this notice is displaced on each page, that is, when
a page is updated!
ssMaritime is owned & © Copyright by Reuben Goossens - All
Rights Reserved.