Steam and Splendor

Steam And Splendor: Treasures From The Ocean Liner And Cruise Ship Ephemera Collection

Now Open

“This exhibit draws upon some of the Museum’s hidden treasures, never before seen by the public.”

Educative, thought-provoking and exotic, this new exhibit brings visitors to a time when ocean travel was leisurely, elegant, and exclusive. “This exhibit draws on some of the Museum’s hidden treasures, never shown to the public,” says Kevin Sheehan, Lead Curator and Collection Librarian of the Maritime Museum. Its collection of ocean liner and cruise ship ephemera, numbering thousands of individual items, is one of the largest in California.” Coupled with vintage brochures, passenger lists, menus, cabin plans, and images of dining rooms and recreational areas, the curators of the exhibit have gathered rare ocean liner-related artifacts from both the Maritime Museum of San Diego collection as well as those generously loaned by local private collectors.

“These displays cover more than 100 years of ocean-going recreational and destination travel, during the great age of steam, and invite visitors to journey back in time to the era of the great ocean liners of the twentieth century – among them the Titanic, SS Normandie, the SS United States, the Empress of Britain and many others,” says Raymond Ashley, Ph.D., K.C.I., President/CEO of the Maritime Museum of San Diego. The exhibit effectively depicts evolving attitudes toward maritime recreational travel through ephemera and artifacts. Shipping corporations enticed passengers aboard their floating palaces with elaborately drawn brochures offering leisurely excursions in sumptuous surroundings to exotic and distant destinations.