 The Queen Mary The Queen Mary was conceived in the late 1920's as the first of a pair of 1,000 foot long ships intended to provide regularly scheduled weekly service between Southampton, England and New York City. Construction began on the No. 534 at the John Brown shipyard in Clydebank, Scotland in December 1930. On December 11, 1931 all construction was halted as a result of the worldwide economic crisis known as the Great Depression. Hull No. 534 languished until April 3, 1934 when a government subsidy and the merger of the Cunard and White Star Lines made it possible for work to continue. On September 26, 1934 Hull No. 534 was launched in the presence of His Majestiry, King George V by his consort, Queen Mary. The Queen surprised and pleased the public by graciously giving her own name to the ship. The heyday of the Queen Mary were the years 1936 to 1939, when she was the flagship of the Cunard White Star Line, soon capturing the prized blue riband for a record-breaking crossing. The Queen Mary was in the mid-Atlantic when Hitler invaded Poland on Friday, August 31, 1939. Loaded with passengers and refugees, she ran a zig-zag course using blackout at night to elude submarines. She arrived safely in New York on Monday, September 4. Converted for use as a troop transport, the Queen Mary spent the next six years transporting over 800,000 troops. During the course of the war, she visited places as far away as Bombay, India; Hong Kong; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and Sydney, Australia. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill credited the ship with shortening the war by as much as a year. After the war she transported troops home and war brides and their babies from Britain to the United States and Canada. After completing war duty, the Queen Mary was converted back for passenger use. She began regular passenger service in July of 1947, this time in conjunction with the Queen Elizabeth, the new flagship of the Cunard Line. The Queen Mary and the Queen Elizabeth were the most successful and profitable team in the history of the North Atlantic. Throughout the 1950's the ships ran full most of the time. By the late 1950's regularly scheduled passenger plane flights were available across the North Atlantic. Almost overnight, massive transatlantic ocean liners became dinosaurs. By the mid 1960's, the Queen Mary was crossing the Atlantic carrying more crew than passengers. The ship was no longer profitable in her former capacity, and Cunard offered the Queen Mary for sale in 1967. The City of Long Beach, flush with tideland oil money, purchased the Queen Mary as a tourist attraction, city icon, hotel, convention center and museum. The purchase may have rescued the ship from the breakers. World-famous and loved by millions, the ship put the City of Long Beach on the map instantly. In 1992, friends of the Queen Mary saved the ship for Long Beach and the world. The RMS Foundation, a non-profit foundation, now manages the ship. The RMS Foundation intends to preserve the ship for display in Long Beach in perpetuity and hopes to return as much originality to the ship as possible. |
