White Star Line
The White Star Line was a prominent ship operating company, most famous for its emigrant ship, the RMS Titanic. The company originated as "White Star Line of Boston Packets" in 1845 as a ship broking business. White Star Line's name and goodwill was bought from bankruptcy by Thomas Ismay for 1,000 pounds sterling on January 18, 1868. As the White Star Line had known previous owners, Ismay began work at creating a relationship with shipbuilders Harland and Wolff who would be commissioned for building all future ships.
Four ships were initially constructed for the Oceanic class; the Oceanic (I), Atlantic, Baltic, and Republic.
Over the 19th century the White Star line would own such famous ships as Brittannic(I), Germanic, Teutonic & Majestic(I). Several of these ships would eventually take the Atlantics Blue Riband.
In 1899, Thomas Ismay commissioned one of the most beautiful steam ships constructed during the 19th century, the Oceanic (II). She was the first ship to exceed the Great Eastern in length if not in tonnage. The building of this ship marked the point where White Star departed from competition in speed with her rivals and concentrated solely on comfort and economy of operation.
In the 19th and early 20th century, the efficiency of coal engines only allowed a feasible speed of about 24 knots (44.4 km/h/27.6 mph). Going above this speed introduced a logarithmic proportion in direct relation to fuel consumption and speed, in that for every knot increased, the required fuel was the previous fuel required plus itself. For this reason, the White Star Line committed to comfort and reliability rather than to speed. As an example, the Titanic was designed for travel at 21 knots (39 km/h), while the Cunard Line's Mauretania held the speed record in 1926 for 27 knots (48 km/h).
In 1902, the White Star line was absorbed into the Internation Mercantile Marine (IMM), a large American shipping conglomerate. By 1903, IMM had managed to absorb the Dominion, Atlantic Transport, Leyland, and Red Star lines. They also came to trade agreements with the German lines Hamburg-Amerika and Norddeutscher-Lloyd. Bruce Ismay ceded control to IMM in the face of intense pressure from shareholders and J.P. Morgan, who threaten a rate war.
The Cunard Line was the direct competition to White Star Line as their fame and success mounted. As a competition piece, the White Star Line began construction on their new series, the Olympic class; the RMS Olympic, RMS Titanic, and RMS Britannic. Britannic had originally held the name Gigantic, but was changed after the sinking of Titanic to Britannic to save the company from looking too proud (and as an appeal to patriotism as World War I loomed).
The history of the White Star Line was marked by some terrible disasters as well as a lot of bad luck. In 1873 the Atlantic was wrecked near Halifax, costing 585 lives. In 1893, the Naronic vanished with 74 passengers and crew after departing Liverpool for New York. In 1909 the Republic was lost after a collision with the liner SS Florida. In September 1911, the Olympic was involved an a collision with the warship Hawke in the Solent, badly damaging both ships. In April 1912, the Titanic was lost after an historic iceberg collision. During world war I, the last sistership of Titanic, HM Hospital Ship Brittannic was lost after striking a mine. She sank in less than 50 minutes with the loss of 21 lives. Of the three sister ships only one ever completed a commercial voyage. In 1934, the Olympic crashed into the Nantucket Lightship sinking it and killing seven of the crew.
It may be noted that in stark opposition to its competition, the White Star Line had named all their ships with an 'ic' ending, as opposed to Cunard Line's use of 'ia'.
In 1933, White Star and Cunard were both in serious financial difficulties because of the depression, falling passenger numbers and the advanced age of their fleets, particularly, White Star's. Work had been halted on Cunards's new giant, hull 534 (later known as the RMS Queen Mary), in 1931, to save money. In 1933, the British government agreed to provide assistance to the two on the condition that they merge. The agreement was completed on 30 December [[1933].
White Star Line merged with Cunard Line on the 10th May, 1934 , creating Cunard-White Star Limited. However Cunard Lines finally won out, purchasing all outstanding shares of White Star Line in 1947.
