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.
Please Note: I, Reuben Goossens is trying to once again contact two very dear friends in Rotterdam Holland. They are Ruud and Wilma (Wilma worked at ‘Ikea’ near Rotterdam). Please see the link below for images, etc. http://ssmaritime.com/Looking-for-Wilma-Ruud-in-Rotterdam.htm for details.
I am now 80 years old and have been years critically ill for many
years, and have sadly lost their details, etc. Thank you if you are able to
assist. PS: Wilma’s surname may be ‘Rinck’, I have lost a
great deal of memory.
**********************
Parts of this page has
been written by Samuel Elisha.
Due to Dr. Reuben Goossens having
retired due to old age and illness, as I am an old friend since the early
1980’s, of both Reuben and his late wife Betty, and I will be writing
parts of this page, whilst some other parts will still be by Reuben Goossens.
However, I will always sign off as follows. S.E.
Introduction:
ssmaritime.com features
simply countless Classic Liners and the occasional cruise ships as of recently
modern cruise ships are presented as a part of a ‘New World of
Cruising’! Reuben some time ago added a New Feature on the new CUNARD
Cruise Ship M.S. Queen Anne. In the past he
operated CruiseAustralia.com for countless years and was a firm
supporter of P&O, Princess Cruises, etc, etc. And I cruised with them
countless of times, be it on various around world voyages or one way world
sailings, etc. Also countless cruises on almost all P&O ships (par the
Pacific Sky) But my favourite at that time was the Sitmar’s and
the P&O Australia’s T.S.S. Fairstar, and much later the
beauitiful, the best P&O Australia ship ever the M.V. Pacific Aria,
but sadly she is gone says Reuben who sailed on her many times, now they have
those big hotel ugly far too high boxes, with (what an real Liner designer told
me) a sort of hull below it, as they are terrible. I, S.E. asked him
what was the worst cruise ever, he said that was simple. I did an
around the world cruise with Princess Cruises on the Pacific Dawn. The ports
were very good, the ships crew were the worst ever, and the female
entertainment director was more like a walking foul mouthed, calling passengers
all sorts horrible thing and telling hen to (f) something off. Over all the
voyage was poor and I wrote about it and I will not sail with Princess even if
they gave me a free suite! Of course I only pay for a de-Luxe suite, whenever a
cruise! S.E.
**********************
Please Note: All ssmaritime and other related maritime
sites are 100% non-commercial and privately owned, thus ssmaritime has NEVER
been financially been 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, and in those
days there where those who would come to him for advice from a good number of
countries, and he was always happy to assist. Reuben has been a very close
friend of mine. But sadly Reuben is now 80 years of age and in poor health,
thus he decided to retire. Yet, by now he has written around 1,610 Great
Classic Liners, and Passenger-Cargo Liners as well as humble converted C3
converted Migrant Liners, which transported countless thousands of migrants to
the new world, but also countless of Cruise Ships’ on his CruiseAustralia site
which is no longer online. Amazingly; ssmaritime.com has received
7,579 Billion visitors to late 2024. Considering this site has been online
since 1992 (although he was writing long before that) and countless
people have visited this site well over hundred’s of times. This makes up
that huge (to the globe’s number population) of visits, thus
this is the most visited maritime site on the Globe! Cunard’s Commodore
from the QE2, P&O Captain’s from the S.S. Oriana and S.S. Canberra,
and countless others well known ships and companies from, Holland, Germany,
America, Italy Greece, and the Israeli designer of the S.S. Shalom, have all
written to Reuben as well as countless companies who desired to place
advertising on his site, but he always refused, for he kept ssmaritime as a
non- profit site, and desired it to be 100% unbiased! He has been given some
fine 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, and those who are Ship
enthusiasts, or those who are just seeking information. I trust that this site
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 S.S. Gothic
on which He and the Queen sailed on he from 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, and a few still
required quite some work to be done be completed. Of course none of these were
listed on the ssmaritime Index. Thus with my assistance myself and Reuben have
been 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 Reuben online, and they can be found on Dear Mr. Goossens, of course there
was also one, from Buckingham Palace which we could not publish for obvious
privacy reasions. Reuben.
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 32+
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) thus during all those many years you have been
reading and reading, I am completely amazed. But more so about the amazing
letters and emails I have been receiving over the many years, including one
from Prince Philip, may He Rest In Peace, Lord’s and Sirs, but his H.R.H.
wrote me regarding my feature, (which I am currently updating) on the
Royal Yacht the ‘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 reason, I have also received countless letters from
Lord’s, Sirs etc, and 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 originally basic ssmaritime.com in the later days became the one of the largest and famous Maritime website, 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, thus ssMaritime has been paid for into the 2030’s, thus you can continue to view it and hopefully provide wonderful and joyful memories for past passengers from around the world, and for those who really love passenger liners and older cruise ships!
It certainly has been a great joy
for me to present these classic liners for the 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 1992.
As I stated earlier Dr. Reuben
Goossens is now retired due to his rather poor health, being disabled in
addition he also has poor eyesight, the last item “As seen on the top of
this page was done with great difficulty. Over the years Reuben has received thousands
of Dear Dr. Goossens emails of thanks and today this 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.