Against all odds, the ship’s speed stayed secret. The newspapers kept on guessing, the public speculating. Once Commodore Manning took command of the ship, however, Gibbs worried that the famously independent captain would do what he wanted.
Despite his nervousness, Gibbs did his best to keep his mouth shut. Speaking for his firm, William Francis said that “I have no connection with the operation of this ship, except occasionally when my advice is asked.”13
Finally, after two weeks of parties, tours, and photo ops, the Big Ship was ready for her first paying passengers, all eagerly awaiting one of the most thrilling trips in Atlantic history.
24. A VERY FAST LADY
Boarding began at 9 A.M. sharp on July 3. In front of Pier 86, there was a crush of honking taxis. Earlier, stevedores had secured the three passenger gangways—first, cabin, and tourist—to the ship’s side. Conveyor belts carried stacks of steamer trunks into the cargo holds; each passenger was allowed twenty-five cubic feet of trunk space, a generous allowance, especially when compared to the almost nothing that passengers could take on the new, cramped transatlantic turboprop planes.
For Bismarck’s bakers, the day had started at four in the morning, as they began to make the dough for hundreds of bread loaves and dinner rolls. Down below, Kaiser’s engineering team began to fire up the eight boilers to get up a full head of steam. Lazy wisps of smoke started drifting from the two finned stacks. On the bridge, the quartermaster began filling out the deck log, which recorded all navigational data for the ship’s voyage. It was one of four such logs maintained by the ship’s officers. There was also the official log, listing passengers, crew, and cargo, which had to be filed with the U.S. Coast Guard. The bell book recorded all signals given from bridge to engine room. Finally, there was the highly confidential engineer’s log, which recorded engine performance data.1
Glancing out the bridge windows, Manning could see the first rays of dawn bathe the skyscrapers of Manhattan in pink and orange. A steaming cup of coffee rested beside the log book as he penciled in “Winds: SW-3, Weather: Clear; longshoreman aboard; resumed loading #3, 4, 5 hatches.”
Asked by reporters what his hopes were for the maiden voyage, Manning answered, “I’ve been instructed to keep to schedule. After all, the main thing is a safe passage.”2
Hoping for last-minute cancellations, fifty candidates showed up at Pier 86, luggage in tow and passports in hand. All of them were turned away.
Just before passengers started boarding, the entire stewards department lined up along the first class enclosed promenade for inspection. Epaulets, gold braid, and brass buttons glinted in the morning sunlight. The ship’s executive officer, Frederick Fender, came down from the bridge to look for crooked bow ties and scuffed shoes. As he did, he reminded the crew what an historic occasion the voyage represented, and how the United States Lines expected the best from everyone.
General John and Emily Franklin had Suite U-92-94. Their twenty-two-year-old daughter, Laura, had U-90, her own stateroom next door. As a little girl, she had traveled aboard Manhattan and Washington on her father’s business trips, and once found herself on Vincent Astor’s knee. “He always wore a blue cap aboard the ship,” she recalled.3
As soon as she boarded the new ship, Laura knew this would be an experience nothing like sailing on the stuffy old Manhattan and Washington. United States was sleek, modern, and fresh. As she walked through the public rooms, she took in the aroma of fruit baskets, Chanel No. 5, and champagne. The strains of Meyer Davis’s saxophones and violins drifted in and out of earshot. All around, elegantly dressed people filled the air with expectant chatter and laughter. Laura overheard two words pop up in many conversations: Blue Riband.
“You just felt the excitement the minute you put your foot on her,” she recalled. “We seemed to know from the start she was out to break the record….”4
When she opened the door to her parents’ suite, Laura saw two huge bedrooms, a large living room, and three private bathrooms. The suite even had its own trunk room. Unlike the dark, wood-paneled suites on the Queens, it was airy, spacious, and well lit. Once in the suite, Laura scanned the first-class passenger list. On board were Fritz Reiner, conductor of the Metropolitan Opera; Sara Roosevelt, FDR’s granddaughter and a cousin of the Astors; and General David Sarnoff, president of RCA, the Radio Corporation of America. Next door to the Franklins were Vincent Astor and his wife, Minnie.[5] They occupied Suite U-87-89, the already-famous “Duck” Suite named for the pink pearl murals that decorated its walls.
Margaret Truman (daughter of the president, who was, even at that moment, still opposed to the government’s role in the liner’s construction and operation) was staying one deck below the Franklins in Cabin M-55. She shared a room with her friend Drucie Horton, married daughter of Treasury secretary John W. Snyder. Margaret told the press that she was going on a six-week vacation to Europe, and was traveling on United States not as the president’s daughter, but just as a tourist.
General Franklin, who was anxious about the comfort of his most important passenger, asked his daughter if she could go down the corridor to check on how Miss Truman was doing.
“I went over to the cabin, which was full of people, all very excited,” Laura recalled of her visit to M-55. She introduced herself to Margaret, who “was very informal, lovely.”
Amid the chattering visitors was an unassuming, middle-aged lady, clad in a raincoat. She was standing by herself, holding a drink.
Laura walked over to her and said, “I’m Laura Franklin.”
“I’m Bess Truman,” the woman replied.
“You could have knocked me over with a feather!” Laura recalled. “I was talking to the First Lady, with no secret service people around. She was very sweet, very modest, and I had a lovely talk with her.”
Laura asked if the first lady needed anything.
“No I have my bourbon here, thank you very much,” Bess Truman replied.5
Bess and Secretary Snyder both came aboard to see their daughters off. All four posed at the rail for the New York Herald Tribune photographer, big smiles on their faces. This time the Secret Service appeared in force. George Horne observed them “brushing aside eager amateur photographers and women eager for a look at the President’s wife and daughter.”6
Margaret Truman also took the time to talk to a few of the musicians in the first-class orchestra. “She had come out of her way to tell me how she’d enjoyed the music,” one of them recalled, “and she was just a lovely person.”7
Unlike the trials and delivery voyage, Gibbs invited many of the important women who helped decorate the liner on her maiden voyage: Dorothy Marckwald and Anne Urquhart, along with sculptress Gwen Lux. Elaine Kaplan was not on board—her husband had booked a trip to Canada, much to Elaine’s chagrin. However, she complied and went on vacation with him instead of going on the maiden voyage. Admiral Edward Cochrane was not making the trip, either.
5
Vincent and Minnie Astor divorced shortly after the maiden voyage. In 1953, Vincent married Brooke Russell, who inherited the bulk of his fortune and became a world-famous philanthropist, giving away millions to cultural and humanitarian causes. Brooke Astor died in 2007 at age 105. Two years later, her son Anthony Marshall was convicted of plundering her $198 million estate.