MAJESTIC'S FATE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 59, 10 March 1936, Page 6

MAJESTIC'S FATE.

LINER TO BE BROKEN UP.

Britain's second largest liner, the CunardWhite Star Line's 50,915-ton Majestic, is fast nearing the end of her career, says the London "Daily Express." Once the prido of Imperial Germany, afterwards a symbol of her humiliation, the Majestic is to be offered for sale. Her name does not appear in the revised sailing list for the North Atlantic service. The Berengaria and the Aquatania will carry on the service until the Queen Mary enters the field on May 27. Thus the Majestic will follow her famous sisters in the line, Mauretania and Olympic, to the Land of Forgotten Ships. She began life as the Bismarck. The Germans built her before the war in a blaze of publicity. She_was their answer to Britain's Mauretania —the last word in size and luxury. One thousand staterooms were built into her, equipped with all the luxuries of the day. Three thousand passengers could he carried. Wireless was fitted in her lifeboats —then a novelty. The Kaiser himself named her, and watched her great bulk slide into the water. But she was not destined to sail under the Imperial flag. War intervened. was not completed until 1921. Then she was handed over, prize of the victors, as reparations. The White Star Line bought her. The Bismarck became the Majestic.

Since then she has crossed the Atlantic more v than 400 times; steamed a million and a quarter miles. Scores of the world's most famous people travelled in her, welcomed her steadiness, enjoyed her solid luxury, came to look upon her as a friend. Now her proud days are nearly over. The bright, clean paint will be allowed to peel from her eides. Her luxurious fittings will be stripped from her in readiness for the sextons of the shipping world—the breakers. Sir John Jarvis, M.P., "fairy godmother" to the Tyne, declared: "When the time comes I shall certainly make a bid for the Majestic and have her broken up at the Jarrow yards." And that will mean more work for the men who have made ships since ships were made—the Geordics of Tyncside.