"...to deliver the passengers fattened and lethargic."

Food, as has been discussed in posts throughout the week, has always held a privileged place on an ocean liner. Just as Commodore Robert G. Thelwell discussed his weight problem, it should be no surprise that passengers faced that very same "Battle of the Bulge." The following comes from Mrs. Velma Krauch, who traveled aboard the Queen Mary on her final crossing from Southampton to Long Beach in the latter part of 1967:

Along about now Hannah and I were beginning to feel the sins and corruption of a cruise diet. While dressing for dinner one night I walked into her cabin fumbling with the zipper on my skirt, gasping, "Good Lord, look at this. What will I wear for dinner if the waistband on my one and only long skirt gets any tighter?"

Before she could answer, Bill popped in with his perennial cheer, and offered, "There's not a thing wrong with the waistband...why don't you try doing something about the f-a-t underneath it?"

He did have a point, miserable as it was.

Of course the lazy days laying in the sun, leisurely swimming in the pool, and sitting around the Smoke Room before dinner with drinks and appetizers, did little to stem the flow of obesity. Whenever I attempted a good brisk, athletic walk around the deck, my inborn magnetic compass automatically pulled in the direction of a steward serving either boullion and crackers or tea and pastries. Cunard, I know, had to fulfill her side of the contract with Long Beach, but I have a sneaking suspicion that somewhere in the fine print was a line that read, "and to deliver the passengers fattened and lethargic."

I imagine that many of Mrs. Krauch's fellow travelers would have heartily agreed with her.

References: Velma Krauch, Three Stacks and You're Out: A light hearted account of the Last Voyage of the R.M.S. Queen Mary around Cape Horn (Los Angeles: VanLee Enterprise, 1971), 90-94

A Gala Dinner on the Normandie

The Compagnie Générale Transatlantique - more commonly known as the French Line - celebrated the Normandie's debut with a gala dinner aboard the new liner. Everyone in France's high society was there, along with President Albert Lebrun and his wife. Even Sir Percy Bates, the head of the rival Cunard Line, was among the attendees. As the presidential couple entered the ship's magnificent dining room, all one thousand people waiting for them stood up and feverishly applauded. As everyone rose, it is said that the sound of chairs scraping agaist tile was deafening.

The dinner was to represent the very best of French cuisine. Only the finest would do. The chefs prepared a grand meal that included courses of turtle soup, turbotin aux poireaux, canard rouennaise braisé, and finally finished with a brand-new dish called Bombe Normandie. It was "a sinfully rich chocolate-covered finale that, appearing for the first time that night, would reappear repeatedly at numerous banquets to follow." To complete the evening, coffee and candy was distributed to the diners in good order.

It was a highly successful and elegant beginning for the Normandie's painfully short career.

References: John Maxtone-Graham, Normandie: France's Legendary Art Deco Ocean Liner (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007), 118-119.

Sir James's Table

Of all the masters who commanded the RMS Aquitania during her lengthy career, it can be argued that Commodore Sir James Charles was by far the most popular. Commodore Robert G. Thelwell described him as "the most remarkable man I served in my life at sea." His seamanship was superb and he radiated a sort of serene confidence to all who encountered him. He commanded "The Ship Beautiful" for most of the 1920s, and according to historian Daniel Allen Butler:

He was quite possibly the most debonair captain ever to stand on the bridge of any liner: square-jawed, handsome, and dignified in his double-breasted jacket with its four bands of gold braid on the cuffs and two rows of decorations on the left breast, Charles looked and acted every inch the part of a master of the most popular ship on the Atlantic.

He was a charming, affable and humorous host who always kept his passengers entertained and absolutely delighted with stories of his early days at sea. If the man himself was impressive, however, his table was even more so.

Sir James was a known trencherman, or hearty eater. His table was scene to tremendous culinary undertakings, as Elspeth Wills explains:

Whole roast oxen or small herds of gazelles, surmounted by hillocks of foie grass decorated with peacock feathers, were wheeled to [Sir James's] table where champagne was served in jeroboams and soufflés were size of chef’s hats. Confectioners spent hours creating centre pieces in carved ice or spun sugar: on one occasion an electrically illuminated Battle of Waterloo was carried in to the ship’s orchestra playing Elgar.

Is it any wonder that Commodore Sir James Charles was so popular among the passengers?


References: Commodore Robert G. Thelwell, I Captained the Big Ships, comp. Robert Jackson (London: Arthur Barker Limited, 1961), 36.

Daniel Allen Butler, The Age of Cunard: A Transatlantic History 1839-2003 (Annapolis: Lighthouse Publishing, 2003), 241.

Elspeth Wills, Cunardia: A steamer trunk of titbits, trivia and trifles. (London: The Open Agency, 2005), 24.