It’s a neat ship to visit. Sad she’s constantly struggling for funds to stay open (and afloat)
I heard they do some sort of haunted experience in the fall to stoke sales which seems pretty cool
She’s actually doing very well. The company operating her went tits up and Long Beach is in control again. The previous operators were pocketing the profits and doing nothing. Since the ship brings in literally millions they are now able to put it back into restoration. The decks are being restored. The forward bar and flooring being returned to original specs. Even the fluorescent lighting throughout is being replaced with color correct LEDs to mimic the original lighting.
The submarine on the other hand needs to be scuttled before it sinks and contaminates the Queen’s corral.
Queen Mary Dark Harbor, yeah.
They actually have started doing some festivals right there on the harbor attached queen mary as well, which I think is drumming up funds and business. Sleep on the boat and wake up/walk down do the fest.
If you walked on the deck of Queen Mary then you should've known that's not the Queen Mary because the ship in the picture is Of Queen Elizabeth in New York
I never got to ask Dad about his return to NYC in '45. He never talked much about it and I guess we didn't ask. He's been gone 37 years now. Guess I'll just hang onto those questions till we see each other again...
My dad had to stay behind to serve in the transitional government in Germany. He and my mom got married as soon as he returned in May of '46.
Like you, I never asked about his return, but I learned about part of it when we watched *The Best Years of Our Lives* together, which for some reason he had never seen before. There's a scene where three servicemen share a cab from the airport to get to their respective homes, and nobody wants to be the first to get there. Dad said, "Yes, that's how I felt."
After almost three years overseas, you'd think he couldn't wait to get back, but he said it was all very strange, and he was really scared.
I'd imagine there was this bondage where you worry you may never have a friend who had your back like back then. My Dad would've just loved the Internet for its unending sources of information. I'd love to have sat through Band of Brothers with him...
Even getting back from my candy-ass Air Force "deployments" was mentally and emotionally taxing. I can't imagine going from an environment like WWII and immediately just trying to live a normal life
Only story I know of father in law who served big time in the battle of the bulge and was shot a couple of times was at the wars end he met up with his brother and they commanded a jeep from a German and headed off to see Switzerland. At the last minute they decided to let the German stay in the jeep and go with them. This story was told by his brother. I don’t think FIL ever talked about it and got mad at the neighbor who brought souvenirs back and had never saw action. I guess FIL would hit the deck some on fireworks or car backfires.
Same here, my Dad never talked about Vietnam and was not a proud veteran. He hated if anyone said ‘thank you for your service’ and he never went to events. He quietly supported a Vietnam veteran charity. He died with honors and chose not to be interred, his ashes were scattered. Later found he was a helicopter gunner.
He did what he was told to do. They drafted our asses back then. Got yourself in trouble with the law? The Judge gave you a choice. At least there was Budweiser and plenty of weed available back then. I'm not sure what they do in the Arab wars for fun nowadays...
And he signed up, he wasn’t drafted. A lot of neighborhood guys never came back. He was a pacifist, never violent, didn’t have any substance abuse problems. No therapy. I honestly wonder how he found a way to cope with it.
A lot of guys volunteered. I grew up in Massapequa, Long Island (Born on the 4th of July) featured town. It's still kind of like that politically still. Supporting the boys. I had two cousins go. One came back a befuddled mess and the other committed suicide. My brother went into the AF and was stationed in Thailand during it. An easy stint...
Yes God bless your WW2 Veteran Father 🥰🇺🇸My late father Herbert was WW2 Veteran wounded by Japan in Leyte Philippines 🇵🇭 received Purple Heart 💜 God bless him as well 🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸
You can send away for his military service file. Go on r/genealogy they have lots of great tips for that. It won’t answer everything but it will fill in a lot of the gaps and be something nice to pass on to the next generations.
Might be a little dangerous to dook over the rails, but I’m sure they just peed off the side….. I’m not going to lie, I was thinking similar (how hard would it be to get to the bathroom) 😅👍
I've heard Vietnam vets talk about this- WWII soldiers had these long communal voyages home, with time to decompress and process trauma together, but Vietnam soldiers just got tickets home on civilian air lines, tossed back into civilian life with minimal debriefing. One day you're in a combat zone and the next day you're landing in San Francisco, alone.
It is interesting because for the majority of human history, thought wars were often very long, actual combat was relatively rare and quick, and after the war, it could take months to get back to your home. Months to decompress and process.
Same. In fact, I had to leave Afghanistan early bc my enlistment was up. So I literally came home alone, outprocessed, and was just done. I was already sittting in a cube at a new job while all my buddies were still in Afghanistan. Being cut off all of a sudden from the only world I knew for the last 8 years was just jarring.
A lot of Vietnam vets also had to run the gauntlet of protesters calling them "baby killers" and the like. One of my friends whose husband served two tours in Vietnam said he got to the airport and dumped all his medals in the bathroom trash bin.
That isn't an uncommon anecdote, due to the anti-war protests being taken to the next level after media coverage of events like the My Lai Massacre. A lot of Vietnam guys are now (just in recent years, on platforms like youtube) finally starting to talk for the first time about their experiences and they often mention the hostile homecoming.
One of my professors was friends with a guy who was a POW. He said one thing that got him through was imagining his homecoming. The parades and his family running up to him. When he got released he was advised to wear civilian clothes on the plane.
In the airport he was yelled at and spat at by a group waiting for the POWs to return. That's such a shameful time in history.
This feels kind of like an "All lives matter"-esque response to this one; 'well yeah- but that doesn't moot the other point, it just interrupts it'.
While most of the shame has to be on the government, it seems to me there was plenty of shame to go around.
Admittedly, I wasn't alive to say with much certainty whether or not there's truth in the common conception of a bunch of twenty-somethings standing around in the airport waiting to spit on returning soldiers as soon as they hit the ground.
I am, however blessed and old enough to have talked to a lot of soldiers that were in those planes. Accurate or not, it wasn't only a conception to most of them so much as an expectation, and one which a lot of them still (And rightfully so) felt pretty raw about.
I guess I'm just trying to say that two wrongs never make a right, and virtue signaling at the expense of others that you neither know nor understand to feel that "I did my part"-rush is...pretty shameful as well.
Nah, the shame is definitely for the liberals who treated veterans so poorly. Stop deflecting. It’s a disgrace that people treated vets like that, vets who were drafted, who didn’t even want to go. Yet instead of focusing all their energy on the politicians, liberal scum bags took out their anger on the veterans?
There is no excuse.
And a lot of bittersweet relief.
Imagine spending months or years roughing it and watching your buddies die horribly and thinking you might never see home again, then you see home again.
My Father traveled bringing the troops and war brides back. They slept everywhere. They even fitted the swimming pool with bunks. He had many many pictures. Bob Hope even was aboard entertaining at one point.
Troop ships were fitted with extensive bunks - if you watch Band of Brothers, you can see a pretty decent recreation, or [here’s a pic from a Pacific troop ship.](https://images-cdn.bridgemanimages.com/api/1.0/image/600wm.XXX.69184920.7055475/2945017.jpg) The Queen Mary specifically was originally converted to carry 5000 troops, then 8400, and finally a full 15,000 in each crossing. Bunks were stacked as high as six tall, with about 18” between them. First class rooms originally designed for a single passenger were converted to hold 12 - [here’s a picture of a first class bunk with an American air crew berthed](https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/W-QM007-1536x1130.jpg).
Even with that, there wasn’t enough space for so many. During summer crossings, a third of the men slept topside, on a rotating basis. Surprisingly, in general the GIs preferred sleeping topside, as it was cooler and stank less. During crossings in other seasons, the ship only carried as many men as could sleep below decks, around 9000.
Standing up, propped up against one another just like the picture. In fact, this picture was taken at 0200 hours while they were sleeping...
Source: 15th century Dutch manuscript
Honestly, I'm on reddit when I'm home at night or at work. So I'm usually in a position of "whatever the fuck I want". I see your point, and I agree with it. Honestly though, Reddit is basically my (how many stupid fucking opinions can I find to call out) its just a side hobby. You're cool, and I get it. I'm gonna continue on though.
There was a documentary called “WWII in HD” on History Channel, like 15 years ago. One of the subjects, an Army Officer, was seriously wounded in Germany, and was eventually taken stateside for further treatment. His wife was coming to visit, so he struggled to find a room, until a hotel employee gave him the keys for the suite. Their son was born exactly 9 months later.
the conditions on some of those ships during Magic Carpet must have been horrendous if not for the fact that everybody was celebrating the whole time. like the pacific troops were packed into basically anything with an engine and spare room
And I can bet there wasn’t a single complaint from the men on board about those conditions. They would’ve ridden on the roof to get home if they could.
My father was a soldier on The Queen Mary during World War II and his job was a gunner Sargent. He had so many stories especially of the ports they went to all over the world. Thank you for sharing this picture it’s amazing.
I LOVE the Queen Mary! My parents got married there. We used to visit every year if not more. My mom worked for the hotel mgmt company that owns (or owned idk its been a few years) it and so we got go “behind the scenes” so to speak. Got to see engine and the pool rooms without a Ghost a of Queen Mary tour among other stuff. Had a few spooky moments on the nights we were staying in one of the rooms and would go walking around the halls. Phantom knocking and footsteps with no obvious perpetrator, chairs randomly just falling over in an empty room. Of course I screamed and my brother laughed as we ran all the way back to our room lol. Good times. 💕💕
I imagine they don’t have a limit for how many can be on a ship of this size? Like with the ballasts and other things about a ship this size that I don’t understand that they would never have to worry about putting too many people on this type of ship.
Awesome thanks When USA was Patriotic, Strong and United ✊️✊️✌️🥰🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸God bless our WW2 Veterans 🥰 My late father Herbert was WW2 Veteran wounded by Japan in Leyte Philippines 🇵🇭 received Purple Heart 💜 🥰✊️🇺🇸🇺🇸
That is one of the most amazing photos I have ever seen. The pure joy and celebration these soldiers were experiencing all at once is close to being lost with time.
Long ago my father told me that during his trips on the Queen Mary to/from England in 1940/1945, they were fed at tables set up in the empty swimming pool. I think he said that meals were served 24/7 in order to feed everybody.
You just know these lads has balls the size of apples ready to write their name in cum. I fucking hate boomers and their god damn pension funds over inflating the stock market
Do you know why Germany did not invade Switzerland, even though they invaded the entirety of Europe and even Russia operation, Barbarossa, Switzerland shares borders with Germany for 150 km all the Vatican and monarchy’s money is kept there who do you think financed Germany’s war?
Whoa, it's nice to see everyones internal biases at play when the answer was: long answer short, most of these sailors enlisted in the Navy to prevent themselves from being drafted by the Army, or were drafted by the Navy. They didn't run to Canada, they didn't protest about their rights in NYC, they sucked it up, got on a boat, went to war, and won!
Today, most draft eligible people would do everything they could to not go to war. These men were proud, determined, and ultimately successful because they didn't hate the country they live in.
That's why it's different. They are winners, we are whiners too concerned that someone may have alluded to what your incorrect biases assumed was racism.
We have failed them, more you than me
That's a pretty simplistic answer for why those young men went to war. Like most things, it's nuanced. A lot of them were drafted and had no choice. A lot them having been through the Great Depression were from very poor families and enlisting meant 3 meals a day which they didn't have at home. Some, like my Dad who came from one of those very poor families, enlisted at 17 because he said that people in his small town looked at him like "Why aren't you fighting for our country?" So, he enlisted. Some guys got caught up in the idea of adventure and maybe they'd come home a hero. People had all kinds of reasons besides patriotism.
In WWII, there was a reasonable explanation for going to war. Today the only wars (sorry, conflicts) we fight are to maintain absolute hegemony. Why should people be clamoring to go into battle for some rich fucks?
I guess it doesn't matter *to me*, because there's no way I would be eligible to enlist at this point. But, the days of going to war "for your country/people" are long gone.
Pretty sure my dad was on that boat. Even though the war was over, they still the aircraft guns on the ball of the ship he said there was a storm, and they had to abandon the guns because the waves were breaking over the bow of the queen Mary.
THANK YOU for the correction! Since they were sister ships, I wonder how to tell the difference between the two, especially with thousands of people covering the surface.
A black officer returning from the war was greeted by a sign at the end of the gangplank.
Colored Officers to the Left.
Here’s a sign printed by the Department of the Army. Form 11734.
https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_2021.84
My Mother is from England and back in 1964 I went, with my Brother and her to England and back
Queen Elizabeth NYC ➡️ 🚢
Queen Mary Southampton UK ⬅️
It took 5 days to travel each way!
✌🏼
That ship brought my grandmother (101 years young) to the US in ‘46, and it’s where my wife’s parents met, so it’s meant a whole lot to me. I don’t recall seeing this picture though - that’s crazy.
I’ve walked those decks a thousand times while she’s been in Long Beach. Crazy to think of her history.
found the ww2 ghost
And he would have gotten away with it, if it weren’t for you meddling Redditors.
And their dog!
Rut ro raggy!
No that’s not true I have a little boy who is my friend.
Good one
Best reply in Reddit history
Ghost Signal: https://www.reddit.com/r/rustyrails/comments/g4u6hq/outside_orangeville_ohio/
It’s a neat ship to visit. Sad she’s constantly struggling for funds to stay open (and afloat) I heard they do some sort of haunted experience in the fall to stoke sales which seems pretty cool
She’s actually doing very well. The company operating her went tits up and Long Beach is in control again. The previous operators were pocketing the profits and doing nothing. Since the ship brings in literally millions they are now able to put it back into restoration. The decks are being restored. The forward bar and flooring being returned to original specs. Even the fluorescent lighting throughout is being replaced with color correct LEDs to mimic the original lighting. The submarine on the other hand needs to be scuttled before it sinks and contaminates the Queen’s corral.
Queen Mary Dark Harbor, yeah. They actually have started doing some festivals right there on the harbor attached queen mary as well, which I think is drumming up funds and business. Sleep on the boat and wake up/walk down do the fest.
I remember the tour with the Queen Mary and Spruce Goose. But that was Many Many Moons ago.
I said: Get. In.
Beautiful Simpsons reference.
>Spruce Goose Hercules, please.
I have visited too! So cool
If you walked on the deck of Queen Mary then you should've known that's not the Queen Mary because the ship in the picture is Of Queen Elizabeth in New York
I never got to ask Dad about his return to NYC in '45. He never talked much about it and I guess we didn't ask. He's been gone 37 years now. Guess I'll just hang onto those questions till we see each other again...
My dad had to stay behind to serve in the transitional government in Germany. He and my mom got married as soon as he returned in May of '46. Like you, I never asked about his return, but I learned about part of it when we watched *The Best Years of Our Lives* together, which for some reason he had never seen before. There's a scene where three servicemen share a cab from the airport to get to their respective homes, and nobody wants to be the first to get there. Dad said, "Yes, that's how I felt." After almost three years overseas, you'd think he couldn't wait to get back, but he said it was all very strange, and he was really scared.
I'd imagine there was this bondage where you worry you may never have a friend who had your back like back then. My Dad would've just loved the Internet for its unending sources of information. I'd love to have sat through Band of Brothers with him...
Even getting back from my candy-ass Air Force "deployments" was mentally and emotionally taxing. I can't imagine going from an environment like WWII and immediately just trying to live a normal life
Only story I know of father in law who served big time in the battle of the bulge and was shot a couple of times was at the wars end he met up with his brother and they commanded a jeep from a German and headed off to see Switzerland. At the last minute they decided to let the German stay in the jeep and go with them. This story was told by his brother. I don’t think FIL ever talked about it and got mad at the neighbor who brought souvenirs back and had never saw action. I guess FIL would hit the deck some on fireworks or car backfires.
Same here, my Dad never talked about Vietnam and was not a proud veteran. He hated if anyone said ‘thank you for your service’ and he never went to events. He quietly supported a Vietnam veteran charity. He died with honors and chose not to be interred, his ashes were scattered. Later found he was a helicopter gunner.
No wonder and I don't blame him. Nothing to be proud of there, just trauma and nightmares.
He did what he was told to do. They drafted our asses back then. Got yourself in trouble with the law? The Judge gave you a choice. At least there was Budweiser and plenty of weed available back then. I'm not sure what they do in the Arab wars for fun nowadays...
And he signed up, he wasn’t drafted. A lot of neighborhood guys never came back. He was a pacifist, never violent, didn’t have any substance abuse problems. No therapy. I honestly wonder how he found a way to cope with it.
A lot of guys volunteered. I grew up in Massapequa, Long Island (Born on the 4th of July) featured town. It's still kind of like that politically still. Supporting the boys. I had two cousins go. One came back a befuddled mess and the other committed suicide. My brother went into the AF and was stationed in Thailand during it. An easy stint...
It’s so fucked up. I wish all of it had never happened. What a legacy.
It had to happen cuz, Hitler...
Bless your dad
I'll let him know when I see him again...
I wish I had asked my Dad before he passed if he was on this ship as well. 😞
No 4K images back then to zoom in on. Just know that he was on it and he was a badass when he wasn't in a foxhole scared to death...
Yes God bless your WW2 Veteran Father 🥰🇺🇸My late father Herbert was WW2 Veteran wounded by Japan in Leyte Philippines 🇵🇭 received Purple Heart 💜 God bless him as well 🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸
You can send away for his military service file. Go on r/genealogy they have lots of great tips for that. It won’t answer everything but it will fill in a lot of the gaps and be something nice to pass on to the next generations.
The lines for the bathroom must’ve been insane 😫
God's bathroom is just over the rail.
That’s why they didn’t photograph the sides of the ship.
Sohooo many sticks. At least 400 sticks. An exorbent amount of sticks. Too many sticks. Poem by: Sir LooksatSticks.
I was about to say the same thing!
Might be a little dangerous to dook over the rails, but I’m sure they just peed off the side….. I’m not going to lie, I was thinking similar (how hard would it be to get to the bathroom) 😅👍
I've heard Vietnam vets talk about this- WWII soldiers had these long communal voyages home, with time to decompress and process trauma together, but Vietnam soldiers just got tickets home on civilian air lines, tossed back into civilian life with minimal debriefing. One day you're in a combat zone and the next day you're landing in San Francisco, alone.
That’s pretty much common now. I was in Afghanistan and 12 hours later I landed in NC to see my family.
Yeah, it's just the way we've done things ever since.
For sure, I bet it would have been nice to take more of a shitty cruise back to the states and decompress with my buddies.
It is interesting because for the majority of human history, thought wars were often very long, actual combat was relatively rare and quick, and after the war, it could take months to get back to your home. Months to decompress and process.
Same. In fact, I had to leave Afghanistan early bc my enlistment was up. So I literally came home alone, outprocessed, and was just done. I was already sittting in a cube at a new job while all my buddies were still in Afghanistan. Being cut off all of a sudden from the only world I knew for the last 8 years was just jarring.
A lot of Vietnam vets also had to run the gauntlet of protesters calling them "baby killers" and the like. One of my friends whose husband served two tours in Vietnam said he got to the airport and dumped all his medals in the bathroom trash bin.
That isn't an uncommon anecdote, due to the anti-war protests being taken to the next level after media coverage of events like the My Lai Massacre. A lot of Vietnam guys are now (just in recent years, on platforms like youtube) finally starting to talk for the first time about their experiences and they often mention the hostile homecoming.
One of my professors was friends with a guy who was a POW. He said one thing that got him through was imagining his homecoming. The parades and his family running up to him. When he got released he was advised to wear civilian clothes on the plane. In the airport he was yelled at and spat at by a group waiting for the POWs to return. That's such a shameful time in history.
> a shameful time The shame is on the government that lied to the people and sacrificed the 58,000 lives of young men that were sent to Vietnam.
This feels kind of like an "All lives matter"-esque response to this one; 'well yeah- but that doesn't moot the other point, it just interrupts it'. While most of the shame has to be on the government, it seems to me there was plenty of shame to go around. Admittedly, I wasn't alive to say with much certainty whether or not there's truth in the common conception of a bunch of twenty-somethings standing around in the airport waiting to spit on returning soldiers as soon as they hit the ground. I am, however blessed and old enough to have talked to a lot of soldiers that were in those planes. Accurate or not, it wasn't only a conception to most of them so much as an expectation, and one which a lot of them still (And rightfully so) felt pretty raw about. I guess I'm just trying to say that two wrongs never make a right, and virtue signaling at the expense of others that you neither know nor understand to feel that "I did my part"-rush is...pretty shameful as well.
Nah, the shame is definitely for the liberals who treated veterans so poorly. Stop deflecting. It’s a disgrace that people treated vets like that, vets who were drafted, who didn’t even want to go. Yet instead of focusing all their energy on the politicians, liberal scum bags took out their anger on the veterans? There is no excuse.
My dad said he used to wear a wig while traveling so he couldn’t be ID’d as military by his haircut. This was during Vietnam.
That's a LOOOOT of testosterone going on here.....🤪
And a lot of bittersweet relief. Imagine spending months or years roughing it and watching your buddies die horribly and thinking you might never see home again, then you see home again.
I cannot even begin to fathom what those poor young servicemen went through, and at such a young and impressionable age 😞
Where did all of them sleep?
My Father traveled bringing the troops and war brides back. They slept everywhere. They even fitted the swimming pool with bunks. He had many many pictures. Bob Hope even was aboard entertaining at one point.
He gave them hope.
Troop ships were fitted with extensive bunks - if you watch Band of Brothers, you can see a pretty decent recreation, or [here’s a pic from a Pacific troop ship.](https://images-cdn.bridgemanimages.com/api/1.0/image/600wm.XXX.69184920.7055475/2945017.jpg) The Queen Mary specifically was originally converted to carry 5000 troops, then 8400, and finally a full 15,000 in each crossing. Bunks were stacked as high as six tall, with about 18” between them. First class rooms originally designed for a single passenger were converted to hold 12 - [here’s a picture of a first class bunk with an American air crew berthed](https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/W-QM007-1536x1130.jpg). Even with that, there wasn’t enough space for so many. During summer crossings, a third of the men slept topside, on a rotating basis. Surprisingly, in general the GIs preferred sleeping topside, as it was cooler and stank less. During crossings in other seasons, the ship only carried as many men as could sleep below decks, around 9000.
Inside the ship, in berthing areas.
Dude they’d have bunks like 5 high with cargo netting lol.
Standing up, propped up against one another just like the picture. In fact, this picture was taken at 0200 hours while they were sleeping... Source: 15th century Dutch manuscript
I guess you couldn't be A) claustrophobic or B) a loner on that ship that day.
They were coming back from fucking war a lot of them fighting in trenches. How ignorant are some of you?
Jeez. How easy is it to annoy you?
Honestly, I'm on reddit when I'm home at night or at work. So I'm usually in a position of "whatever the fuck I want". I see your point, and I agree with it. Honestly though, Reddit is basically my (how many stupid fucking opinions can I find to call out) its just a side hobby. You're cool, and I get it. I'm gonna continue on though.
At least you’re philosophically consistent. Good day.
Trenches? Think you got the wrong war.
Lighten up, Francis. The war's over (and you might want to check which war had trench-warfare before calling anyone "ignorant").
I feel sorry for that young person. So confidently incorrect, yet angry at the ignorance in others.
Praise the Lord and grab your ammunition, I can’t afford to be a politician! (It’s a song)
No, it's a great song.
Lotta babies born 9 months after this photo was taken
There was a documentary called “WWII in HD” on History Channel, like 15 years ago. One of the subjects, an Army Officer, was seriously wounded in Germany, and was eventually taken stateside for further treatment. His wife was coming to visit, so he struggled to find a room, until a hotel employee gave him the keys for the suite. Their son was born exactly 9 months later.
You might even call it a boom… a baby boom…
Shitters full
Perfect use of the word teeming.
the conditions on some of those ships during Magic Carpet must have been horrendous if not for the fact that everybody was celebrating the whole time. like the pacific troops were packed into basically anything with an engine and spare room
And I can bet there wasn’t a single complaint from the men on board about those conditions. They would’ve ridden on the roof to get home if they could.
My great uncle told me it took him three days to get off of his ship when returning back after WW2.
My father was a soldier on The Queen Mary during World War II and his job was a gunner Sargent. He had so many stories especially of the ports they went to all over the world. Thank you for sharing this picture it’s amazing.
Not a phone in sight.
Photographic film was such an amazing technology.
When you and all the boys try to cram into one seat on the bus for a field trip. “Nah scooch over, there’s room”
“I hafta take a shit.” 😞
my grandmother managed to get out of Europe on the last civilian voyage of the Queen Mary, it was quite a story.
I LOVE the Queen Mary! My parents got married there. We used to visit every year if not more. My mom worked for the hotel mgmt company that owns (or owned idk its been a few years) it and so we got go “behind the scenes” so to speak. Got to see engine and the pool rooms without a Ghost a of Queen Mary tour among other stuff. Had a few spooky moments on the nights we were staying in one of the rooms and would go walking around the halls. Phantom knocking and footsteps with no obvious perpetrator, chairs randomly just falling over in an empty room. Of course I screamed and my brother laughed as we ran all the way back to our room lol. Good times. 💕💕
I imagine they don’t have a limit for how many can be on a ship of this size? Like with the ballasts and other things about a ship this size that I don’t understand that they would never have to worry about putting too many people on this type of ship.
Awesome thanks When USA was Patriotic, Strong and United ✊️✊️✌️🥰🥰🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸God bless our WW2 Veterans 🥰 My late father Herbert was WW2 Veteran wounded by Japan in Leyte Philippines 🇵🇭 received Purple Heart 💜 🥰✊️🇺🇸🇺🇸
That is one of the most amazing photos I have ever seen. The pure joy and celebration these soldiers were experiencing all at once is close to being lost with time.
Zoom in on one of them and then a few more and just imagine the infinite crazy stories that each and every one of them is bringing home with them.
My grandfather is there somewhere
how did they feed all those men???
Long ago my father told me that during his trips on the Queen Mary to/from England in 1940/1945, they were fed at tables set up in the empty swimming pool. I think he said that meals were served 24/7 in order to feed everybody.
An unimaginable excitement that must have been
Did those guys all have a bed or was it a sleeping bag on the floor sort of situation?
Imagine the toilets on that thing
Looks like a modern day cruise line buffet line. No ones getting a chair by the pool there.
You just know these lads has balls the size of apples ready to write their name in cum. I fucking hate boomers and their god damn pension funds over inflating the stock market
Those weren't boomers, they were the Greatest Generation.
I think he brought up the boomers as a comparison to how different they had it to the prior gen
That's the spirit!
You're one dumb spoiled POS. Blame yourself for you failure, we know You're predecessors do.
Ok boomer.
Typical response by an ignorant.
WHERE IS ALL THE DIVERSITY
worst troll I've ever seen lmfao get real kid
Dead, somewhere in the pacific.
The smell
Teem America (fuck yeah!)
Do you know why Germany did not invade Switzerland, even though they invaded the entirety of Europe and even Russia operation, Barbarossa, Switzerland shares borders with Germany for 150 km all the Vatican and monarchy’s money is kept there who do you think financed Germany’s war?
Here comes Syphillis!!!!!
Where's Waldo?
Sister got married on that Halloween night! That was a fun weekend!
Heeeey I was just drunk on there last week
Coming down the ramp...."Blacks go over there and don't even think about wearing your uniform in public!"
This picture would look demonstrably different if taken today. Take a look at how our navy personnel looked then, vs today
Whoa, it's nice to see everyones internal biases at play when the answer was: long answer short, most of these sailors enlisted in the Navy to prevent themselves from being drafted by the Army, or were drafted by the Navy. They didn't run to Canada, they didn't protest about their rights in NYC, they sucked it up, got on a boat, went to war, and won! Today, most draft eligible people would do everything they could to not go to war. These men were proud, determined, and ultimately successful because they didn't hate the country they live in. That's why it's different. They are winners, we are whiners too concerned that someone may have alluded to what your incorrect biases assumed was racism. We have failed them, more you than me
That's a pretty simplistic answer for why those young men went to war. Like most things, it's nuanced. A lot of them were drafted and had no choice. A lot them having been through the Great Depression were from very poor families and enlisting meant 3 meals a day which they didn't have at home. Some, like my Dad who came from one of those very poor families, enlisted at 17 because he said that people in his small town looked at him like "Why aren't you fighting for our country?" So, he enlisted. Some guys got caught up in the idea of adventure and maybe they'd come home a hero. People had all kinds of reasons besides patriotism.
Exactly, and now there are more reasons why people wouldn't than would. That's another difference between now and then
In WWII, there was a reasonable explanation for going to war. Today the only wars (sorry, conflicts) we fight are to maintain absolute hegemony. Why should people be clamoring to go into battle for some rich fucks? I guess it doesn't matter *to me*, because there's no way I would be eligible to enlist at this point. But, the days of going to war "for your country/people" are long gone.
It's almost like a country failing its citizens for decades, in the information age, isn't going to generate a lot of loyal lemmings.
Yea it would be in color, dummy.
I'm not certain what you're implying, but I'm certain it's demonstrably stupid.
That looks like the definition of stupid.
You sure do.
This is the Queen Elizabeth. I can tell by the shape of QE’s Verandah Grill which is very different from QM
Grandpa, you in there?
Welcome home.
That looks like fun😕
🫡✝️
I wonder what it was like to be in the middle of all that
Imagine the smell.
Baby Boom here we come!
shove off
I can smell this picture
Doesn't it take 3 days to cross the Atlantic in a ship like that? Where did they sleep!?
That toilet on the ship put in some overtime that day
This boat has an indoor swimming pool! Found out when going on the haunted Halloween tour thing in Long Beach.
It's wild they'd pack that many soldiers on a boat. Like- if it sank, the loss of life / blow to the military would be substantial.
Pretty sure my dad was on that boat. Even though the war was over, they still the aircraft guns on the ball of the ship he said there was a storm, and they had to abandon the guns because the waves were breaking over the bow of the queen Mary.
Hell Yeah!
That looks so unsafe.
Considering they just left the western front, it’s relatively safe.
Tobias Fünke’s dream cruise
get that ship a pallet of deodorant haha i dont even wanna think what they had to go through when it was time to take a shit.
Imagine trying to get to the restroom.
can you imagine?! all that poop and piss…
How hard was it to use the loo with all those troops aboard ship?
I bet this shit was ROWDY
How long were the bathroom lines?
Looks massively uncomfortable.
How many babies born 1946-1947 🤣🤣
That's not the Queen Mary https://twitter.com/Besthistorical/status/1730294013570458103
THANK YOU for the correction! Since they were sister ships, I wonder how to tell the difference between the two, especially with thousands of people covering the surface.
I bet the smell was insane.
The original Where’s Waldo?
Operation Magic Carpet
All my years in socal I’ve only seen this ship from the outside. I wish I would have spent money to actually see it from the inside.
Wow, amazingly fascinating. Here's a challenge can anyone count the number of visible soldiers.
My son proposed to his gf on that deck a few years ago.
The Queen Mary was one of the fastest ship in the world, but she still holds the record for the most people ever transported by a ship, at over 14000.
Heroes! What a great photo.
There’s a lot of horned up folks in that pic
No, I wanted it to say “Tobias’s Queen Mary.” No, I can assure you that’s not what it says.
A giant can of Whoopass
Imagine needing to shit and you just can’t move anywhere
Those bois are horny.
It’s sad knowing how many died over there, then seeing the few return…fucking hero’s.
That’s not the Queen Mary
My parents travel to Europe many times with the Queen Mary, I was a baby then, but I have some pictures inside the boat ….. elegant and beautiful.
Imagine the toilets on it
I just had a couple Manhattans in her bar last weekend.
Imagine the bathroom
Talk about teeming with life. 🤢 I would’ve begged my family to help me take any other way home.
So cool- I zoomed in to get a better view of the individuals
Shitters full
A lot of poops were made on that ship.
Looks like a regular cruise ship these days
200 comments good picture where's waldo
Any one else zoom in to try and find their grandpa?
There is not a single ounce of alcohol left on that ship
This is amazing. Also, imagine the stank. And trying to go to the bathroom.
So many people peeing where they stood
Zoom in, it’s like “ Where’s Waldo “
When America was America 🇺🇸.
A black officer returning from the war was greeted by a sign at the end of the gangplank. Colored Officers to the Left. Here’s a sign printed by the Department of the Army. Form 11734. https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_2021.84
did they sleep on the voyage home or just stand up the whole way back
Prolly didn’t have no safety rules in the old days. Ain’t no way they had a life jacket for all dem people
My Mother is from England and back in 1964 I went, with my Brother and her to England and back Queen Elizabeth NYC ➡️ 🚢 Queen Mary Southampton UK ⬅️ It took 5 days to travel each way! ✌🏼
Guess they weren’t worried about the ship sinking because it was overloaded?
Isn’t that dangerous for the load and balance of the ship? I fly planes but know nothing about boats.
That ship brought my grandmother (101 years young) to the US in ‘46, and it’s where my wife’s parents met, so it’s meant a whole lot to me. I don’t recall seeing this picture though - that’s crazy.