Crystal Cruises Signs Option to Resurrect S.S. United States

Concept rendering of the resurrected S.S. United States

I have always loved ships and the husband and I love to cruise - we have booked another cruise for this coming October which will take us to the Bahamas, Dominican Republic and Grand Turk.  Years ago before it was moved to Philadelphia to languish I had the privilege of being aboard the S.S. United States.  Even in severe disrepair the ship was impressive.  Adding to local interest is that the ship - still the fastest liner ever built - was build just a few miles from where I sit at Newport News Ship Building.  Now, in what will hopefully lead to a full resurrection of the S.S. United States, Crystal Cruises has signed an option to buy the ship and transform it into a luxury liner once more.  Here are highlights from Conde Nast Traveler:

It wasn't that long ago that we made the bold claim that "Crystal Cruises may change cruising as we know it"—and it looks like the luxury cruise line isn't slacking. On the heels of an announcement that it plans to pivot the brand from a cruise-only company of two ships to a veritable lifestyle fleet of ocean, river, and small ships, Crystal also just signed a deal to resurrect the famed S.S. United States—once the fastest, largest, and at times, most glamorous passenger ships ever built in America—as a 400-suite, 800-guest ocean liner.

"It will be a very challenging undertaking, but we are determined to apply the dedication and innovation that has always been the ship’s hallmark,” Crystal President and CEO Edie Rodriguez said in a statement. Crystal Cruises will work with the S.S. United States Conservancy to conduct a technical feasibility study this year, to see how much work will be required to bring the 64-year-old ship up to modern standards; Crystal says it will cover all costs associated with the preservation. When the ship made its debut in 1952, it was a $70+ million beauty, more than 100 feet longer than the Titanic and the ship of choice for the glitterati, everyone from Marlon Brando to Prince Rainier and Grace Kelly. But it was retired abruptly in 1969, and has been docked (and seemingly doomed for the junkyard) on the Delaware River in Philadelphia.

[T]he United States’s mid-century modernism both influenced and helped popularize a newer, fresher, more forward-looking aesthetic.  

So why the need for speed? Per the S.S. United States Conservancy, the S.S. United States was developed to be a "super ship" as part of a Cold War–era Pentagon project; it could transform into a troop carrier, "able to transport 15,000 military service members 10,000 [nautical] miles without refueling" and reach 38 knots, or 44 miles per hour, at sea.  

When the S.S. United States sails again, it will join Cunard’s RMS Queen Mary 2 as the only true ocean liners still on the waves. 

A Last S.O.S. for the S.S. United States

The super liner U.S. United States was built at Newport News Shipbuilding less than ten miles from where I sit typing this post and was launched in the same year that I was born.   In her prime, she was the fastest ocean liner afloat and counted presidents, movie stars and royalty among her passengers.  Now, she is a rusting hulk facing the scrape yard if funds are not raised to maintain her while a plan to develop her into a water front attraction and hotel in New York City are completed.  The S.S. United States is small compared to some of today's massive cruise ships that resemble mammoth hotels slapped on a hull, but her sleek lines and wind swept superstructure recall the days when crossing the Atlantic was most often for the rich and famous.  The New York Times looks at the ship and the fate that I hope she manages to dodge.  Here are excerpts:

A Titanic-sized supership that once ferried presidents, Hollywood royalty, actual royalty and even the Mona Lisa has a place in the history books as the fastest oceanliner in the world. The owners are now racing to avoid having the ship, the S.S. United States, relegated to the junk heap.

A preservationist group, the S.S. United States Conservancy, saved the vessel from being scrapped a few years ago. Its members are working with a developer to give the mothballed vessel a new life as a stationary waterfront real-estate development in New York City, the ship’s home port in her heyday.

Their big dreams, however, now face a financial crisis: Short of money, the conservancy in recent days formally authorized a ship broker to explore the potential sale to a recycler. In other words, the preservationists might have to scrap their vessel.

The conservancy continues to seek out donors, investors or a buyer to preserve the ship and press forward with development. But unless something happens by Oct. 31, the group said in a statement, “We will have no choice but to negotiate the sale of the ship to a responsible recycler.”

The decision to seek bids from scrappers was “excruciating,” said Ms. Gibbs, particularly since the development plan emerged in the last year. “We’ve never been closer to saving the S.S. United States, and we’ve never been closer to losing her,” she said.

In the 1950s and ’60s, the ship was a marvel of technology and elegance, offering regular passenger service between New York and Europe. The 1952 maiden voyage smashed trans-Atlantic speed records. She was so fast, her propellers were a Cold War state secret.

Passenger jets doomed the superliners, however. The S.S. United States left service in the late 1960s. Today she is docked in Philadelphia, stripped of her interiors and rusting in the Delaware River across the street from an Ikea store.

The redevelopment plan is underway, said Keith Harper, vice president for design at Gibbs & Cox, the firm that originally designed the S.S. United States. Late last year, a real estate developer hired the firm to help devise specific ideas for possible reuse. . . . . The ship has roughly 600,000 square feet of floor space.

 
Admirers remain optimistic. Among them is John Quadrozzi, whose company happens to own a pier in Brooklyn big enough to accommodate an oceanliner. He says he would welcome the ship there, where docking costs would be considerably lower. The conservancy is considering the move, if the money can be raised.

The S.S. United States was conceived with two purposes: to provide luxury passenger service to and from Europe, and to quickly convert into a superfast military transport, although that need never arose. Built partly with government funds, the ship represented a powerful expression of American postwar optimism and ambition.

Newspapers speculated on her secret top speed and wrote about her comings and goings like no airplane route gets written about. In the 1950s and ’60s, she was featured in a Disney movie, a Munsters movie, and a sequel to the Marilyn Monroe blockbuster “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” according to a conservancy history. Her twin red-white-and-blue stacks can be glimpsed in the opening of “West Side Story.”

America, unlike much of Europe, destroys its history and historic buildings and, in this case, ships.  The S.S. United States is one of a kind and I hope the funds are found to save her and make her into a waterfront destination.    Consider making a donation here.

New York City - Day 1

We had a great day here in New York yesterday and walked around, picked up tickets for a Broadway show today and had a wonderful dinner with my niece (she operates Kitty Lee Thomas Sweets that has a link to the right on this blog) and closed out the day at the Monster Bar which is just down the street from where we stay. 

During the afternoon we stopped at the Forbes Galleries (there is no admission charge) and enjoyed an exhibit on the liner U.S.S. United States - which was built less than 10 miles from our home in Hampton - along with some wonderful art work.

Dinner was at a Singapore style restaurant called Masak in the East Village.  Whenever we are in New York two things always strike me:  the diversity of the people and how many beautiful guys there are.

The only disappointment of the day was the Monster Bar where the supposed dance party had some of the most awful music I've heard anywhere.  It's kind of shocking when Norfolk clubs have better music than a New York gay club.  My advice to visitors to the City is to avoid the Monster Bar on Friday night.  I love to dance, but we went home and I read a book - the music was that bad.

Today we plan on hitting the street fair in the lower east side near Chinatown where my niece is a vendor, hitting the show this afternoon and then dinner with the daughter of one of the boyfriend's clients who lives just down the street from where we are staying.  We plan on dining at Philip-Marie here in the West Village where we have dined before and never been disappointed.

At the Monster