SS United States: An Operational Guide to America's Flagship

I have read tens of books on liners since 1979. Big fan of them also (having seen QE2 in NYC, stayed in the hotel version of the QM, sailed on QM2, and seen the Big U at her home in Philly (only from the Whitman bridge). Long review short: THIS BOOK ON THE SS UNITED STATES IS AWESOME!!!!!!! It keeps alive her interior rooms (with color photos on page after page) which have been gutted and can't ever be 100% replaced. The descriptions of the propelling system, the steam plant (engines & turbines) are very detailed yet super understandable. I GREATLY enjoyed the plans of the engineering spaces. This also applies to the descriptions of ALL other included descriptions of other aspects of the ship's operation. After pouring over this book, I actually felt I had visited and toured the ship and saw her as she was when she was in service. THIS book keeps the Big U. alive. I don't know that any other book about the United States can come even a tiny bit close to achieving the purpose this book was written to accomplish. Thank you to the authors!

This book covers the actual operation of the various departments. It is unlike your typical ocean liner book and covers what other books do not. I have hundreds of books on liners and this is now my favorite. Even if you already have numerous books on the United States you will learn something new on every page.

I bought the book mainly to add to my large ocean liner library. The title eluded that it was going to be a dry read. In fact, it’s not. It’s actually SO INTERESTING and well researched and written. Glad I own it.

If you’re looking for an in-depth history of the ship, this is not it (which is a good thing; the ship’s history has been told ad nauseam). Instead, SS United States: An Operational Guide to America's Flagship is a look into the ship’s construction, operation, artwork, interiors, etc., and is really geared to folks who are familiar with the ship’s career, but would like to learn more about things that nearly all maritime authors have, for some reason, skipped over.Much of the text is from a manuscript started by the late Jim Rindfleisch. As custodian of the ship for several years after her withdrawal from service, Jim probably knew the ship better than anyone, and the information he left us certainly demonstrates the love he had for her. Everything from the ship’s china and glassware, to forms used during the ship’s time in service, the topics covered are exhaustive. Many are atypical of what one would usually find in an ocean liner book. For example, this is one of the few ocean liner books I’ve seen that details crew discipline, stowaways (complete with photos of the unfortunates!), servants, and corpses (yes, corpses). It’s all here. Although some topics are covered in more depth than others, the reader gets the general idea.Because there’s no timeline or story to follow it’s easy to jump to the topics that are of interest. That’s what I really liked about this book: you don’t have to sit down and read it start to finish in order to ‘get it’. That’s not to say you shouldn’t read the entire book; I’m just saying it’s easy to pick and choose what you want to read about and when.No book is perfect, and this one does have a few quirks. Sometimes the wording of the text can be a bit wonky. Several times I found myself going back and re-reading much of the text simply because the phrasing was a little discombobulated. Because much of the text came from Jim’s unfinished manuscript, my guess is co-authors Bauer and Daywalt decided to change as little of it as possible; perhaps simply out of respect. If that’s the case, props to them for honoring Jim in such a subtle way. One thing’s for sure, you can definitely tell a difference between writing styles throughout the book. Next, some of the photos could be a little brighter and clearer, especially interior promotional shots.Despite my nitpicking over sentence structure and photo brightness, I found this to be an incredibly informative and important book that helped further my understanding of the ship. Is this a must-have for ocean liner fanatics, and especially fans of the Big U? Absolutely, without a doubt. It covers ground that no other book has ever covered, and it does so in a concise and no-nonsense way.

Technical books on passenger ships have always been rare, and as someone who's always been fascinated by the less-romantic aspects of the great Atlantic liners, I've always wanted a book that stripped away some of the layers of secrecy surrounding the SS United States. While this obviously isn't as in-depth as "Titanic: The Ship Magnificent," in terms of format and content, it frequently feels like a longer, more fleshed-out version of the "Workshop Manuals" that Haynes used to publish. As someone who enjoyed that series and still miss it, this was a good move on the publisher's part.Despite being only 216 pages in length, there's are impressive amount of "good stuff" here. As much as I prefer to write a narrative review, it'd probably be easier to simply list some of the standout material:-A set of hull line drawings with body, sheer, and half breadth plans.-Specifications of the ship with hull form details, tank and cargo hold capacities, and displacements.-A series of images showing the ship being constructed at Newport News.-An account of the ship's Blue Ribbon-winning maiden voyage by Chief Engineer Henry Kaiser.-Images of many of the different types of silverware, China, and glassware used onboard (useful for collectors!).-Fairly detailed descriptions of the ship's watertight subdivision, fire safety precautions, and lifesaving gear.-A startup procedure for the engineering plant.-A reconstruction of the deck log and engine room log of Voyage 32.-A list of all the foodstuffs carried aboard on the 270th voyage.-Color coded deck plans of the boiler and engine rooms.-A detailed overview of the $75,000 worth of damage the ship received when it encountered a North Atlantic storm in 1966.Although Schiffer Publishing has been notorious in the past for the poor quality of their editing and photo reproduction, they've done an excellent job for the most part, densely populating the pages with historic photographs, postcards, promotional artworks, menu covers, luggage tags and various paperwork, signage, memorabilia, technical diagrams, and color photographs of the engineering spaces taken in the early 80s. There's so much excellent material here that some of the more obvious exclusions stick out like a sore thumb. While there are plans of a few of the main passenger areas, there are no overall deck plans of the entire ship, which would have helped immensely in keeping the reader oriented. The chapter on passenger accommodation is oddly lacking, with sketchy descriptions of the main public spaces and passenger cabins, and rather poor-quality images sourced from period pamphlets.Of course, this book is billed as an "operational guide," which it largely succeeds as. It was originally advertised at 240 pages, and I feel like those extra 24 pages could have really fleshed out some of the sketchier parts. It's still a very good book as it is now - it's just not a five-star masterpiece.

Well written and not dry at all given the subject matter. A plethora of photos, both interior and exterior of the ship. Anyone that gives this book less than 5 stars is obviously missing the point of this much needed and thoroughly researched book!

Livre passionnant , bien documenté sur ce légendaire paquebot américain , chef-d'oeuvre de Gibbs , toujours détenteur du ruban bleu et dont hélas l'agonie n'en finit pas à Philadelphie ...

More is not necessarily better. A good book uses a leading question, not just a tedious list of information. The book is - sorry to say - exhausting and boring. It lacks the style and refinement to combine trivia such as the ship's China with technical aspects. (see "Deutsches Schiffahrtsarchiv" and you see that you can work scientifically even on such a dry theme like plates and platters). There is no scientific or journalistic approach. It good book is not made by cramming all sorts of information between the covers. Sort the information, put it into context and use a leading question. It is an amateurish book that has been pumped up. Disappointing.

Not many exterior photos of the ship a real let down for me.