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Menu card by the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, (shortened to "CIE. GLE. TRANSATLANTIQUE" and commonly named "Transat"), for passengers. The company apologizes for the wine charge due to WWI circumstances. The verso of the card carries a photo of French troops marching in Palestine. The company was known overseas as the French Line, which was established in 1861 as an attempt to revive the French merchant marine, the poor state of which was painfully highlighted during the Crimean War of 1856. Its first vessel, the S.S. Washington, undertook her maiden voyage on the 15th of June 1864. Aside from operating ocean liners, the company also had a significant fleet of freighters. The Espagne (Spain) was its only large transatlantic liner built for the Company at the Chantiers et Ateliers de Provence in Port-de-Bouc. It entered service in October 1910 on the company's Mexican route.
Although not a dominant player in the trans-Atlantic ocean liner trade until after WWI (in 1907 and 1908, when immigration to the United States was its greatest, the company's share of the market was a mere 10%) and not possessing ships of either great speed or size, it became renowned during the early 20th century for its luxuriously appointed liners. The most notable of these early ships was the S.S. France.
Although its fleet sustained substantial destruction during World War I (with a third of its ships being destroyed), the company recovered during the post-war period, with several famous ships entering service. In 1927, the S.S. Ile de France, the first ship to be styled in Art Deco, undertook its maiden voyage. |
