The Ile de France

The Ile de France, first published in 1960, is a fascinating history of the memorable ship, the Ile de France. The Ile de France was a French luxury ocean liner that served the important transatlantic route between Europe and New York from 1927 to 1959. She was named after the region around Paris known as "L'Ile de France". Her maiden voyage, on June 22, 1927, made the ship the first major ocean liner built after World War I, and the first ship to be decorated almost entirely in a modern Art Deco style. Ile de France became a favored ship of the pre-World War II era among the young and also with wealthy and fashionable elites. Her passenger list would include notables of the day such as Marlene Dietrich, Gloria Swanson, John D. Rockefeller, Buster Keaton, Maurice Chevalier, Will Rogers, Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart, and Marie Curie. When World War II broke out, she briefly served as a troop ship before all her luxurious fittings were removed for conversion into a prison ship. After the war, Ile de France resumed transatlantic operations. In 1956 she played a key role in rescuing passengers from the SS Andrea Doria after that ship's collision with the MS Stockholm off Nantucket, Massachusetts. Her last public appearance was starring as a doomed ocean liner in the 1959 movie The Last Voyage, filmed while waiting to be scrapped in Japan. Included are eight pages of photographs.